In the pursuit of economic growth, countries today are becoming more and more open, and more and more countries are opening their doors to immigration. As international mobility tends to increase due to rapid globalization, underpopulated countries like Germany are constantly turning to migration as a strategy for economic and social mobility. With its immigrant population accounting for a fifth of its total population, Germany has become dependent on immigration as a solution to its population decline (Thomasson 2017). As the main refuge for asylum seekers in Europe today, Germany is facing a massive influx of new citizens. But paradoxically, economists say the country's future is still threatened by population decline, even as immigration fills its huge labor gap (Narula 2016). In this context, underpopulation refers to the way in which the fertility rate in Germany is falling below replacement level, which would soon result in an unsustainable population (Kelly 2013). Despite having hosted more than a million asylum seekers since introducing its open-door policy in 2015, Germany is still expected to face stagnation or a decline in its population by 2030 (Apt 2013: 9). Germany has also seen an increase in the number of cases of attacks against the local population, caused by immigrants. One such report shows how acts of violence by foreign nationals have increased since the peak of the refugee influx in 2015, with the number of German citizens killed by foreign attackers over the past three years increasing steadily reaching 83 over the past two years (Channel NewsAsia 2018). Authorities have since attributed this increase in violent crimes against migrants to the large number of young men entering the country seeking asylum (Eddy, 2018). Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on 'Why violent video games should not be banned'?Get the original essayThe increase in violent crimes against locals by foreign offenders, coupled with the sudden influx of immigrants, has since caused anti-immigration sentiments and led to an increase in xenophobic sentiments among the local population (Perrigo 2018). Exploring the strong anti-immigrant sentiments and xenophobic attitudes among local Germans, I will examine a case study of the ongoing anti-migrant protests that first took place in Chemnitz, East Germany, just a few weeks ago, and which pushed the country into the worst immigration crisis in modern history. In my article, I will examine how Germany's approach to migration is not the most appropriate, especially with the rise of anti-migrant protests, and then propose possible solutions to this problem. Chemnitz is currently under tension after a wave of racist violence following the fatal attack of a local man, apparently by two migrants, which stoked tensions between anti-migrant crowds and counter-protesters of left (Channel NewsAsia 2018). According to CNN, the previously peaceful demonstration, which has since turned into violent protests, was sparked by the alleged murder of local German-Cuban man, Mr. Daniel Hillig, who was attacked by two asylum seekers from of Iraqi and Syrian origin during a street festival on August 27, 2018 (Schmidt, Smith-Spark 2018). Following the revelation of the arrest of the Iraqi and Syrian offenders, more than 5,000 right-wing protesters gathered in the city, all demanding that immigrants leave Germany throughfear for their own safety (Perrigo 2018). The protests also led to the rise in popularity of far-right political parties such as the Alternative for Germany (AfD), which encouraged people to protest and attack citizens they believed to be native foreign (Perrigo 2018). The AfD, the third party in the German parliament, took advantage of this incident to reignite neo-Nazi activity through demonstrations, riots, and Nazi salutes at its demonstrations (Serhan 2018). Neo-Nazi activity in this context refers to the activities mostIt is an insidious variant of right-wing extremism in Germany, which grew significantly after unification (Anderson 2008: 39-46). At the protests, the AfD appeared to applaud the public backlash against immigration, an issue on which the party gained considerable support in the country's general elections last year (Serhan 2018). As The Economist reports, the AfD has reported an exaggerated number of violent crimes committed by immigrants, claiming that there were a total of 447 murders committed by illegal migrants in 2017 (The Economist 2018). In the era of post-truth politics where feelings take precedence over facts, the AfD has exploited and exaggerated facts such as the migrant crime rates in this case, to broaden its appeal to voters, by triggering emotions and feelings of anger among residents (The Economist 2018). Ostensibly, this serves to amplify the distinction between local Germans with authentic German heritage and immigrants, but it also acts as a form of public manipulation by acting according to the party's wishes. Examining the root causes of xenophobic attitudes and anti-immigrant sentiments The current situation is an accumulation of anti-immigrant sentiments dating back to 1993 that still resonate today as Germany struggles with the after-effects of the refugee crisis in 2015-2016 (Scally 2018). . Since then, growing anti-immigration sentiments have manifested themselves in racist attacks against immigrants and the rise of far-right parties due to fear of Uberfremdung (Skipper 2017: 17). Uberfremdung in Germany has been defined as “overforeignization”—the situation where a society becomes “foreign” to its own members due to excessive immigration of foreign cultures (Heckmann, Schnapper 2015). It also led to the subtle return of discrimination based on ethnicity, stemming from the Nazi period, with Germans facing hostility and attacks due to their status as asylum seekers or refugees, or being considered as such because of the color of their skin, regardless of how they are viewed. they stayed in the country for a long time (Scally 2018). This illustrates how post-war subjects of racialization continue to be produced by contemporary migration regimes in modern Germany (Erel et. al. 2016: 1344). In examining how this post-war racialization based on ethnicity applies in the context of the case study, discrimination here refers to how anti-migrant mobs, consisting primarily of local Germans , against those of foreign origin, which include asylum seekers and refugees. and even immigrants converted to German citizenship. Coupled with the increase in violent crimes committed by migrants in the country, this has led residents to fear for their safety due to the presence of immigrants who have been labeled "violent criminals" in light of the protests . This therefore acts as a trigger for the locals who demanded that the immigrants leave the country, toprotect their country, their democracy and their ethnicity, for fear of Uberfremdung. Social Science Theory: Realistic Group Conflict Theory By further breaking this problem down through a sociological lens, anti-immigrant sentiments can be explained with the Realistic Group Conflict Theory which was characterized by Donald Campbell in 1965. The theory Group conflict realist states that the perception of zero-sum competition between groups results in the belief of a "group threat" which in turn leads to prejudice and negative stereotyping on the part members of one group against the other (Sidanius and Pratto, 1999: 17). Applying this theory in context, zero-sum competition, which is defined as one person's gain equals another person's loss, refers to the perceived threat of increasing numbers of immigrants in Germany by fear of excessive foreignization. This then results in the belief of a “group threat” that immigrants pose a threat to the country, which has led to the rise of anti-immigrant sentiments among the local population. Realist group conflict theory also expands the notion of self-interest among natives to incorporate the possibility that harm to one subgroup of natives may be perceived as harm to all natives (Card et. al. 2005 : 9). This explains how local Germans were angered by the fact that a fellow German was injured by immigrants, who in this case are not considered natives, triggering the start of anti-immigration protests in Germany. This also shows how discrimination based on ethnicity occurs where the term "all natives" here does not include that of immigrants, even if they have lived in the country for long periods of time. Aspect of Globalization: Accelerating the Spread of “Fake News” to Mobilize Protesters Looking at Germany's situation from a global perspective, globalization appears to have accelerated the spread of “fake news” by mobilizing protesters to during this period. The globalization of technology allows for the broad and efficient dissemination of information and, in this case, accelerates the use of information technology to disseminate information on platforms such as social media (Bieber 2014). This has since created opportunities for the proliferation of “fake news” on social media platforms. In the case of recent anti-migrant protests in Germany, far-right groups, such as the AfD, have spread “fake news” on social media to mobilize their supporters for violent protests. One example is a widely circulated report on social media that the 35-year-old man who was stabbed was defending a woman from migrants, which the AfD used to stoke residents' anger and gain support for their protests. In this case, globalization perpetuates this situation by intensifying violent protests, where the AfD saw a great mobilization effect for its protest following the “fake news” article. Thesis: The German approach to migration is not the most appropriate While Germany is massively dependent on migration, this issue clearly shows how tense the immigration issue is in Germany, reflecting how the issue of immigration has divided German society (Fielder, Starzmann 2018; Eddy, 2018). As Interior Minister Horst Seehofer said: “The migration question is the mother of all political problems in this country. Many people now associate.