How Portugal has largely avoided racism and Islamophobia amid a migration boom

Among the warehouses of one of Portugal’s oldest ports, conversations are flowing among the men sorting their fishing nets. But not without the help of Google Translate.

The fishers at work include not just Portuguese people but also Indonesians. Thanks to a local ship captain who ventured east to solve labor shortages, Póvoa de Varzim sees a steady supply of deckhands from Indonesia, and now they account for half of all crew mates.

And while an influx of Muslim migrants into a traditional vocation like fishing is the sort of event that would be potentially inflammatory elsewhere in Europe, in Portugal it seems to be working out without much fuss.

“The Indonesians are quite well integrated in the community,” says another ship captain, Manuel Marques. “We were never against their culture. We did not ask them to change a single thing. We tried to make things as easy for them as if they were at home. We do need them, and we know it. There is a mutual respect.”

Portugal stands out among European nations for its openness to migrants, expressed in policies and the attitudes of Portuguese people alike. And while experts warn that the growth of Muslim and South Asian communities in the country and the rise of far-right party Chega are starting to raise challenges, so far harmony seems to be winning out.

“We also have a place to worship here, like a mosque,” says Wahono Lucky, an Indonesian fisher. “I tell my boss that I don’t eat pork – I eat meat, chicken, rice, pasta, but no pork. Muslim, Christian, it’s never a problem here.”

“One of the biggest entry doors for Europe”

By European standards, Portugal has a liberal citizenship and migration system. The number of foreigners has steadily increased since 2020. In 2022, foreigners accounted for 6.8% of the population but made up 10.1% of the total number of contributors to social security.

“We are the only country in the European Union that allows people to come to Portugal without a job,” notes journalist and professor Paulo Agostinho. “We are one of the biggest entry doors for Europe, and we are having problems with Brussels because of that. But Portugal does not have an immigration problem.”

People from former colony Brazil make up about a third of the migrant population. Citizens of the Community of Portuguese Language Countries are also well represented, benefiting from facilitated residency procedures. In recent years, migration from India, Pakistan, Nepal, and Bangladesh has ticked up.

Not all of Portugal’s South Asian arrivals are integrating smoothly. In the agricultural fields of Póvoa de Varzim, the sense of harmony that is palpable portside is elusive.

Lazaro Morgado, a foreman overseeing a quartet of Indians planting seeds, clearly prefers working with a Brazilian, with whom he shares a native tongue. “It is complicated for the Portuguese to work with the migrants,” says Mr. Morgado. “Sometimes they don’t know the procedure, and it is hard to explain. And sometimes they don’t obey the Portuguese worker even though at the end of the day, the Portuguese one is the one directly accountable to the boss.”

Two Indian workers say they paid exorbitant sums – about €14,000 ($15,200) – to visa consultants to get here. “Not all Portuguese like migrants,” notes Hardy Singh, one of the Indian workers, citing experiences of job and housing rejections on account of his ethnicity. “But our boss here is good.”

Back at the port, Mr. Marques wants the Indonesian crews to stay. That’s why he – like other shipowners in the area – houses the workers in apartments scattered across the community and invites them for barbecues. The Indonesian fishers also get minimum-wage contracts and a paid-for trip home for vacation.

“Some Portuguese don’t make as much as them because they are on contract, while we only get paid if we go to sea,” laments Tomas Postiga, an older fisher. But he grasps the importance of Indonesian workers to keep the traditional community afloat and prefers them to workers of other nationalities.

Religious differences are not a problem. “Some are religious. Some are not. It changes nothing,” stresses Mr. Postiga. “It is Ramadan now, but they still work. ... They work hard.”

Muslim Portugal

Portuguese society has not suffered from the sort of construction of stereotypes around and tensions with Muslims that other countries in Europe have, says migration expert Jorge Malheiros at Lisbon University. There was racism and discrimination against some migrant groups, but Islam was long a nonissue.

But “it’s no longer like that.” he adds. There is now “talk about the Islamization of Portuguese society.”

One focal point for such talk is Mouraria, the historical Moorish quarter of Lisbon. It is the kind of place that the far right likes to point to while railing against “uncontrolled immigration,” due to the neighborhood’s multicultural character and history. Migrants from across Africa and Asia live in the Moorish quarter, bringing to it a mix of attire, languages, and cuisines otherwise foreign to Lisbon.

For Masrura Rashid, Mouraria is simply home. She arrived here six months ago, after studying engineering and wandering in the lush tea gardens of Sylhet, Bangladesh. Her father moved to Lisbon first, obtaining the right to family reunification. Now she works at her uncle’s travel agency.

In a street rich in halal butchers and supermarkets, Ms. Rashid does not especially stand out. Donning traditional Muslim attire that fully covers her face, she is keen to learn Portuguese. “It’s easy here,” she shares. “The weather, the environment, the people, it’s all good. This is the first country after my country, so it is the best.”

The rise of Portugal’s far right – which secured a fifth of votes in last month’s general election – does not alarm Abdul Karim, a Bangladesh native. He arrived in 2010 from Saudi Arabia, where there were no avenues to citizenship. Now he is the proud owner of a Portuguese passport, as well as two bazaar-style shops.

“I love Portugal,” he says. “[Chega leader André Ventura’s] party is his party. My work is my work. Portugal for foreigners is great even if the language is hard. Immigrant people come here because migration is easy. People are helpful. There is no racism.”

Why is Portugal so tolerant?

Khalid Sulimange, who grew up Black in a white neighborhood in central Lisbon, has an insider’s perspective on Portugal’s attitude toward race and immigrants.

“The way we do things in Lisbon – it’s different,” says the Mozambique native, who worked for a spell in the United Kingdom as a court translator before returning to Lisbon to run the family restaurant. “We accept more the immigrants here. It is easier here compared to the United Kingdom, even Spain or the United States. ... What’s the reason for that? That’s the million-dollar question.”

He has a few theories. The first is acclimation due to the longtime, prominent role of Black people in sports. Portugal’s national soccer team named its first Black team captain, the widely respected and popular Mario Coluna, in the 1960s.

Portuguese society has also long been mixed-race due to its colonial history. And its people, due to their own history of migration, are more inclined to be welcoming.

There are limits to that view, says Dr. Malheiros, the migration expert. Some Portuguese associate Muslim migration with the lack of integration, lack of security, and other social issues on display in other European nations. And when confronted with Portugal’s history of emigration, Dr. Malheiros says, they would argue that “we were the good migrants. We behaved well when we went to France and to Germany. We are Catholics, not Muslim.”

Nevertheless, the tolerant vision still seems more prevalent in the country. Portugal consistently ranks higher than average for Europe when it comes to openness to migrants. The European Social Survey shows that since 2000, there has been a trend toward openness in Portugal, while the perception of migrants as a cultural and economic threat has gone down.

“Portuguese people are more aware of the difficulties that the migrants [experience],” says Dr. Malheiros. “They are aware of this, so they are tend to be more understanding.”