Banning Muslim Head Scarves
Throughout Europe governments are wrestling with how far to go to respond to calls to lift the veil and ban the head scarf. While the issue in the Netherlands involves full-face veils or burqas, head scarves also have divided publics across the continent. A 2005 Pew Global Attitudes Project survey in the Netherlands found that 51% of the Dutch public favored banning head scarves in public.1 In Germany, 54% also supported a ban while in France an even larger majority — 78% — did so. But in Great Britain, a solid majority (62%) thought the banning of scarves was a bad idea.
Opinion was more evenly divided in Spain, where 43% said the ban is a good idea and 48% opposed it.
Banning Muslim Head Scarves  | Bad idea Good idea  | France  | 22 78  | Germany  | 40 54  | Netherlands  | 46 51  | Spain  | 48 43  | Great Britain  | 62 29 