A German passport is issued to identify citizens outside Germany
Among foreigners officially residing in Germany, there are more Russians than Ukrainians, but they apply for German citizenship significantly less often. As a result, the share of Ukrainian citizens among recipients of German passports is relatively high and tends to increase, while the share of Russian citizens is low and falling. This is one of the conclusions of a study published in January by the German Economic Institute (IW) in Cologne, reports Deutsche Welle.
IW senior economist Wido Geis examined the overall situation with granting German citizenship in 2012-2016. Over these five years, approximately 100,000 migrants received German passports each year, totaling 551,000. Such a large figure, the expert noted, means that the country's population composition is changing noticeably: "Belonging to the German people is increasingly determined not by ethnic origin, but by the fact of living in Germany." This, in turn, leads "to greater cultural diversity in the country."
This is the key conclusion of the study. Another conclusion: the national composition of applicants for German citizenship is changing quite rapidly. The most obvious change: a significant reduction in the share of Turks. While in 2012-2016 (former) Turkish citizens accounted for an average of 21.7% of German passport recipients, their share fell to 14.8% in 2016.
This is partly because a few years ago almost every fourth foreigner in Germany was from Turkey (referring to guest workers invited in the 1960s and their descendants). Now it is only every seventh, as the number of migrants from other countries and regions has increased in Germany. Moreover, there is an apparent decline (for various reasons) in interest among Turks living in Germany in German passports, obtaining which, in particular, requires them, like most foreigners, to renounce their previous citizenship.
At the same time, among people from Poland, Romania, Italy and some other EU states, who do not need to renounce their citizenship (thanks to their countries' EU membership), interest in German passports has grown significantly in recent years. As a result, the share of EU citizens among recipients reached 29% in 2016, the IW study notes. In particular, the share of Poles was 6%, and that of Romanians rose to 3.5%.
Approximately the same share in 2016 was for people from Kosovo (3.6%) and Iraq (3.2%), slightly lower for Afghans (2.2%). These new German citizens have nothing to do with the wave of refugees that arrived in Germany in the fall of 2015 and early 2016, since obtaining a German passport requires legal residence in Germany, typically for 8 years, having a job, and passing language and civics exams.
Thus, we are talking about migrants who came to Germany in the mid-2000s or even much earlier. Indeed (and this is another conclusion of the study), people from Asia and Africa apply for German citizenship on average after 12.5 years of residence in Germany, while Turkish and EU citizens do so even after more than 20 years.
Wido Geis also analyzed in his study the granting of German citizenship to people from Russia and Ukraine (whose influx was particularly large in the 1990s). Naturally, such a large group of migrants as ethnic Germans from Russia was not considered, since they came to Germany as late resettlers on a completely different basis and are not included in the statistics of the Federal Statistical Office (Destatis) used in the study, although many have both German and Russian passports.
According to the IW study, in 2012-2016 former Russian citizens accounted for an average of 2.4% of German passport recipients. In 2016, their share fell to 2.2% (like Afghans), in absolute numbers to 2,375 people.
In the same year, 4,048 Ukrainian citizens received German passports. Their share among all recipients of German citizenship was 3.7% (higher than Romanians and Kosovars), representing a minimal increase compared to the average for 2012-2016 (3.6%). At the same time, the share of Ukrainians among foreigners living in Germany in 2016 was 1.4%, and Russians 2.4%.
If we take a ten-year period, Wido Geis added in a conversation with DW, it can be seen that the number of applicants for German citizenship from Russia is consistently declining, while Ukrainians show a trend of gradual growth. "The conflict around Ukraine did not lead to any sharp changes, although one might expect that the number of people from this country wishing to obtain German citizenship would increase noticeably," the IW expert noted.
In his study, Wido Geis relied on statistics up to 2016. Data for 2017 will be published only in a couple of months, said Destatis researcher Florian Göttsche: "We publish statistics on the acquisition of German citizenship only once a year, usually in June."
Among the indicators calculated by the Federal Statistical Office, one has a rather complex name that can be roughly translated as: "Utilization rate of citizenship potential." According to the DW interlocutor, "it allows us to judge how great the interest of people from a particular country in obtaining German citizenship is."
Last year, this indicator was 4.9% for Ukrainians and 1.8% for Russians. "This means that out of 100 Russian citizens living in Germany for more than ten years and therefore fully entitled to obtain its citizenship, fewer than two people exercised this right in 2016," Florian Göttsche explained.