Abstract:

This article examines Denmark’s 2018 public housing policies, arguing they function as a mechanism for managing Muslim communities in housing estates. It analyses these policies in terms of their ethnonationalist roots, as well as their framing of Muslim communities as threats to Danish social cohesion. The article then shifts focus to the experiences of Muslim residents in targeted housing estates, drawing on ethnographic narratives from Aarhus, Odense, and Copenhagen. These highlight the significance of embeddedness, care, intergenerational ties, and informal support networks for these communities. It discusses how these strengths are directly undermined by government housing policies.

The article demonstrates how these policies reflect a coloniality enacted through racial governance, aiming to banish and erase Muslim communities from their neighbourhoods. By introducing the concepts of coloniality and racial banishment I contend that Denmark’s housing policies serve as tools of social control, used to manage its Muslim population, erase their spatial history, and dismantle community life within housing estates. 

Key words: coloniality – racial banishment – ethnonationalism – ghetto policies– Muslim communities