Counting niqabs and burqas in Denmark: Methodological Aspects of Quantifying Rare and Elusive Religious Sub-cultures

Abstract

Muslim women wearing face-covering clothing are the subject of politically heated debates in a number of European countries, but reliable data on the number of these women (niqabis) are generally lacking. At the request of the Danish government, the authors conducted a survey of niqabis in Denmark; this work is the first attempt to quantify niqabis in a European country by sampling new data from several different kinds of sources. Sociologically, niqabis represent a rare and elusive group, which presents particular methodological challenges. The methods discussed and used, such as stratified sampling, use of key informants, and location sampling, are relevant in the studies of many contemporary religious sub-cultures. Extensive triangulation of the different data provided an estimated number of niqabis of 150, with an uncertainty range of 100–200. This corresponds to 0.1–0.2% of Muslim women in Denmark. These figures tally with current rough estimates in other European countries.

Notes

Notes

1. See, for example, a compilation of statistics on the Belgium homepage of the Lavigerie African mission organisation (Verbist).

2. See www.konservative.dk/nytogdebat/nyheder/2009/august/sider/integrationsudspil.aspx, p. 4, access date: 19 August 2010.

3. See “Fakta om Lars Løkkes burkaudvalg (Facts about Lars Løkke's burqa Committee).” 21 August 2009. Available at: http://www.fyens.dk/article/1462289:Indland-Fyn--Fakta-om-Lars-Loekkes-burkaudvalg, access date: 4 December 2012.

4. An exception is that the about 80% of Danes who are members of the Danish Evangelical-Lutheran church are registered centrally. This allows the tax authorities to distinguish automatically between taxpayers who have to pay the special church membership tax and those who are not members of the church and therefore are exempt from this tax.

5. The main problem with web-based surveys regarding representative sampling is that the potential respondents cannot be selected beforehand by the researchers so that the respondents’ sociological profile may therefore be severely skewed in relation to that of the target population.

6. In 2006, there were 198,319 immigrants and their descendants from the following countries: former Yugoslavia, Turkey, Morocco, Somalia, Afghanistan, Iraq, Iran, and Pakistan. This figure had increased slightly in 2009, reaching 207,599 (Tal og fakta 74). As the majority of Muslims in Denmark are of these national backgrounds, the number of Muslims can safely be estimated to have grown by the same proportion. Thus, in 2009, there were 207,186 × 207,599/198,319 = 216,881 Muslims. The Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life reported a figure of 226,000 Muslims in Denmark for 2010 (Grim and Karim 124), which is line with our estimate for 2009.

7. This estimate is based on the age distribution of predominantly Muslim immigrants and their descendants (see Jacobsen).

8. This was a public Eid-festival which is arranged every year by the Muslim Society and takes place in Valby Hallen. The event is usually the largest and attracts Muslims who normally do not frequent the Muslim Society. It is, however, mainly people of Arab, Somali, and Danish backgrounds who participate.

9. Imran Shah agrees with other informants that niqabis are predominantly found among immigrant women from Morocco and Somalia. He may not know any niqabis of ethnic Danish background. At the time when one of authors of this article (Kate Østergaard) carried out fieldwork in this mosque in 2004–2005, no niqabis were observed among the converts.

10. No information about the number of parents could be found for 3 of the 16 schools.

11. A study of participation in religious services at festivals showed that 33.3% of Muslim pupils in Danish upper-secondary schools participate in religious services at least once a month, 19.4% a couple of times a year, 11.1% only during festivals, and 16.7% less than once a year, while 16.7% reported that they never attend (Jensen). On the basis of these figures, between 67% and 83% of the pupils would attend an Eid-festival. The study is, however, mainly based on Muslim pupils from a Pakistani background, a group which—according to other studies—tends to be more practising than most other Muslim groups (Gundelach and Nørregård-Nielsen 51–3). Therefore, we have estimated the percentage to be 60%.

12. If we increased the percentage from 60% to 75% (which is clearly an over-estimate), the projection would result in no more than 134 niqabis.

13. The upper and lower 95% confidence limits would be about ±50% of this figure.

14. 65% of 2,100 converts is 1,365; 65% of 2,800 converts is 1,820. 4/90 of these numbers are 61 and 81 niqabis, respectively.

15. The 95% confidence interval is 24–196 niqabis among the female Muslim converts in Denmark.

16. The two proposed amendments were in the penal law section concerning illegal coercion, where the maximum sentence was increased from two to four years, and in the Administration of Justice Act, where witnesses are now explicitly forbidden to hide their faces (see www.berlingske.dk/politik/laes-regeringens-burka-papir, access date: 4 December 2012.