Angela the beleaguered

WHEN Angela Merkel bravely decided to tackle Europe’s migrant crisis head-on, she may have underestimated the challenge. By refusing to limit the number of refugees Germany would take in and insisting that the rest of the European Union accept some too, Mrs Merkel committed her country to two enormous projects. The first was to absorb a vast wave of immigrants very quickly. The second was to finish the job of creating the common EU external-border and immigration system which the union’s open internal borders require.

Germans at first greeted Mrs Merkel’s bold move by cheering in the streets and handing out sweets to refugees. But as the size of the immigration wave becomes apparent, the mood is shifting fast (see article). The numbers are straining towns’ capacity to provide migrants with shelter and public services. Some 51% of Germans now say they are worried about the migrants, up from 38% a month ago. Mrs Merkel’s popularity has dropped to its lowest level since the start of the euro crisis in 2011. Protesters’ placards and even a television news show depict her wearing a Muslim chador (see picture). Her rivals, and some allies, are demanding that she slow down or reverse course. Some have called for closing the borders to refugees.

Mrs Merkel may have to make short-term compromises, but she should not surrender her principles. Those who accuse her of making policy on the fly with little notion of the consequences are correct: precisely because Europe faces a migrant crisis with unforeseeable consequences, its leaders need to act quickly. After leaders wasted the summer futilely shuffling migrants along or building fences to keep them out, Mrs Merkel forced the European Union to face reality. The only way EU states can handle the crisis properly is by acting together.

Ever since Mrs Merkel took the lead on the crisis, critics have begun speaking as though she created it. That is nonsense. By late August, hundreds of thousands of asylum-seekers were already making their way through Europe. It was no longer possible to pretend that the problem did not exist or belonged to someone else. Those who criticise Germany’s decision to welcome them seldom explain what they would have done instead. Should the migrants have been fenced out and trapped in Serbia, as Viktor Orban, Hungary’s prime minister, attempted, or dumped back on recession-stricken Italy and Greece? Should they have been rounded up and returned in locked trains to slums and refugee camps in the Middle East? What European voters would have stood for such a mass deportation? Not Germans—to their credit.

The world would be a better place if more of its people lived in safe, prosperous countries with the rule of law. Rich countries cannot be expected to welcome everyone who wants to move there, but today they take in only 14% of refugees worldwide. While wealthy Germany struggles to absorb hundreds of thousands of refugees, Syria’s neighbours—Turkey, Lebanon, and Jordan—have sheltered nearly 4m of them for years. So it is hard for Europe to argue that it has done all it can to honour a legal obligation—to offer asylum to those who need it—that it freely acknowledges.

And the refugees it takes in will ultimately make Europe stronger and wealthier. Fears that immigrants will drain public finances and steal jobs have always proved to be wrong in the long run. In a tub-thumping speech on the evils of immigration this week, Theresa May, Britain’s home secretary, wilfully disregarded the latest research (see article).

The risk that European societies fail to integrate Muslim newcomers is genuine. But the solution lies in governments’ own hands: help them become Europeans, by mixing immigrant housing into native districts, as Stuttgart has; by compulsory language and integration lessons such as those in the Netherlands; and by granting asylum applicants work permits.

Just now, Germany faces a large surge in immigration. To regulate the flow, Germany and the EU are negotiating with Turkey to curb the people-smugglers and help Syrians settle there. For the plan to work, the EU must vastly increase aid and press Turkey to offer refugees the right to work; the EU will also have to grant Turks visa-free travel.

A job to do

Turkey is just part of the answer. The flow of refugees could last for years, and Europe urgently needs a common asylum system. EU-funded hotspots to process applicants quickly would help. Member states need to live up to their promises to beef up Frontex, the EU border agency. Agreements to distribute 160,000 asylum-seekers across the EU should be expanded. Mrs Merkel understood that it is in Europe’s own interest to be more humane to asylum-seekers. The alternative is chaos.