The future of Islam in Europe

Dr H.A. Hellyer, Fellow at the Centre for Research in Ethnic Relations at the University of Warwick and Founder-Director of the West-Muslim world relations research consultancy, the Visionary Consultants Group (UK, Egypt & Malaysia), visited Switzerland for a series of debates around the future of Islam in Europe organised by the British Council.

Dr Hellyer is a United Nations ‘Global Expert’ on minority-majority relations, political philosophy, and the interplay between religion and modernity. He was Ford Fellow of the Project on US-Islamic World Relations at the Brookings Institution (USA).

During his visit, Caroline Morrissey did an interview with Dr Hellyer on the subject of the recent Swiss referendum on the construction of minarets, called Of Minarets, Switzerland, and Islam. There is also a visual documentation of his visit.

Swissinfo.ch, the main Swiss broadcaster's news portal, published an article titled "Muslims are now 'us' not 'them'".


10 March 2010, Swiss Forum for the Study of Migration and Population, University of Neuchâtel, Lunch debate with

• Bianca Rousselot (University of Berne): “Not against Muslims, but against Islam as a social order” - the Vox-Analysis of the Popular Initiative to Ban the Construction of Minarets in Switzerland, and
• Matteo Gianni (University de Geneva): Integration after banning minarets? Expert on multicultural societies and immigration policy

11 March 2010, lecture at the University of Fribourg with Professor René Pahud de Mortanges


For further information, please contact This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it , Director British Council Switzerland.

Photos on this page: Chris Tribble