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4.1.6 Main Problems for NGO Monitoring of Hate Crimes and Victim Assistance
Major challenges in the field of hate crime monitoring and victim assistance, explicitly or implicitly discussed by the interviewees, can be summarized in the following four general categories: 1) the overall social-political background; 2) the context in which public institutions operate; 3) the organizational capabilities and profiles; and 4) the attitudes or the climate among victims or minority members.
General Challenges
Before continuing, we should first mention a number of issues that are important in understanding the broader socio-political context in Poland. The following problems were pointed out by the interviewees in various ways. First, there seems to be a general lack or shortage of awareness of issues surrounding hate crimes, racism, homophobia and discrimination in Polish society. Secondly, the interviewees pointed to how under-represented the subject is in the media and political debate. Thirdly, respondents expressed concerns about gaps in the legal system or the unsuccessful execution of the existing laws, which makes it hard to effectively counter hate crimes. The fourth challenge is overcoming the disadvantages faced by marginalized groups, in particular undocumented immigrants and refugees. Needless to say, this also includes forms of prejudice and discrimination, particularly towards »visible« ethnic or cultural minorities and LGBT individuals.
Failure of Public Institutions to Recognize Hate Crimes
Governmental institutions (police, prosecutor’s offices and public administration) have repeatedly minimized or ignored hate crimes. The media is no exception. As a representative of the Kazakh Community, Balli Marzec notes with criticism: »The topic [of hate crime] is completely unrepresented in the Polish media and among Polish NGOs and governmental organizations. Not only is the topic of hate crime not discussed enough in Poland but also the issue of inter-ethnic relations in general.«
Marta Abramowicz of the Campaign Against Homophobia explains this in terms of deficiencies in Poland’s legal system: »The term hate crime is not very well recognized in Poland. In comparison to the United States, there is no legislation in Poland relating to hate crime. […] In Poland, an act of violence is qualified on the basis of an article in the Criminal Code, not on the basis of the rationale [behind the crime] or the perpetrator’s motivation. […] All this makes it difficult to gaining an insight into the scale of this phenomenon.«
Andrzej Romańczuk of the Russian Cultural and Educational Association points to the problem of police’s reluctance to recognize the racist or neo-Fascist background of crimes because the authorities do not want to admit the scale of the problem. In such situations, organizations or individuals attempting to intervene are given the responsibility of proving this background:
»There is a necessity to collect information to prove that violent attacks are not a rare phenomenon, as it is claimed by the police officers. […] It is convenient for the police to show once or twice a year that these crimes were committed by a [right-wing] sub-culture or simply to categorize such crimes as »hooliganism« and not treat them seriously. It is necessary to prove that such cases can not be simply considered hooliganism, but have an ethnic, racial or religious basis, but in the Polish reality, proving this is almost impossible.«
Authorities’ reluctance to intervene has also been seen in cases of group-based discrimination. This is related to the greater issue of police lacking the skills and knowledge to appropriately deal with hate crimes. Andrzej Romańczuk from the Russian Cultural and Education Association affirms: »The police usually fail to identity the perpetrators of racist acts. Police definitely need training in this field.« Representatives from the Chechen Community and Union of Jewish Communities have expressed similar frustrations related to police response to their communities in earlier chapters. As already discussed, the Roma communities have struggled in simply getting the police to even investigate attacks.
The failure of public institutions to recognize the ideological background of crimes serves as a factor in reproducing difficult structural conditions for some members of minority communities. This, in combination with a certain degree of prejudice among some politicians, police officers and administrative officers, only creates patterns of intolerance and attempts to silence the hate crime problem.
Organizations’ Limited Capacity
There seem to be two major reasons for the scarcity of monitoring and victim assistance projects among NGOs and informal groups. One reason resides in the limited capacity of a given organization to carry out this kind of task. »Limited capacity« can be understood in terms of a shortage of resources and can be divided into both internal and external factors. Obstructive factors within the organization encompass areas such as:
• modest infrastructure: insufficient office space, no access to the Internet, no website etc.
• limited financial resources to employ staff specialized in monitoring
• insufficient time resources of members, volunteers and/or activists who are already involved in various formal or informal activities
• shortage of knowledge/skills to keep track of and deal with hate crimes
• lack of language skills to benefit from international cooperation.
As Marek Kubicki of the Arabia.pl Association describes in an interview: »Systematic monitoring is […] a matter of time; [it] requires the recording of cases, the networks of correspondents, the creation databases.« Malika Abdoulvakhabova of the Rescue Foundation also points to limited time as a major factor in not monitoring hate crimes on a regular basis.
External factors also impede NGOs from fully maximizing their activities. These
include:
• a linguistic and cultural gap (mainly in case of migrant/refugee communities)
• lack of social capital within a local community (contacts with officials, cooperation with police, links to media/journalists, support and recognition by educational institutions and community leaders etc.).
Another major reason for not systematically monitoring hate crimes (and/or offering victim assistance) lies in the specific objectives of the organizations, which place their focus on other issues. These objectives include, but are not limited to, providing civic and legal or social aid to members of minority groups, migrants or refugees (e.g. Helsinki Foundation for Human Rights, Rescue Foundation for Chechen migrants and refugees), general education and cultural activities related to human rights, tolerance and inter-cultural/interfaith dialogue (e.g. Polish Humanitarian Action), and the preservation and promotion of minority cultures and traditions in Polish society (generally, all national, ethnic, religious and migrant minority groups studied). Zbigniew Holda of the Helsinki Foundation for Human Rights stresses that:
»[The foundation] is a strictly legal organization; our aim is the protection of human rights. Monitoring hate crimes is not our main aim. We do it irregularly (only in exceptional cases), and we do not provide assistance to victims. We do not collect any data. […] The reason why we do not work on hate crimes is that there are many other things we have to concentrate on: legal aid, access to the courts, monitoring the protection of prisoners’ rights, freedom of religion and belief, etc. There are not so many organizations in Poland working in those spheres; that is why we prefer to stay focused.«
Attitudes of Victims and/or Members of Minority Groups
The fact that victims and their communities are reluctant to complain to law enforcement about incidents—or avoid reporting incidents altogether—seems to be one of the most serious issues. Marcin Kornak of Nigdy Więcej explains: »Minorities have difficulties overcoming their fear.« Nomondalai Erdenechimeg of the Mongolian Student Community admitted that: »It is not common for our community to go to complain to the police.« One of the reasons for this avoidance might be distrust in law enforcement attitude and effectiveness, as well as general fear of being »doubly« stigmatized.
Migrants and some of the other minority groups also demonstrate a certain degree of mistrust towards Polish NGOs (including human rights organizations). Some respondents also implied that inter-ethnic tensions or competition between minorities within an organization might be a factor that weakens the potential for effective work in countering hate crimes.
(OPP)
