Introduction

Abstract

The Netherlands is a dynamic migration society. It has received more than 150,000 immigrants annually since 2010, and more than 200,000 from 2015 onwards. In fact, the immigration record was broken every year between 2006 and 2020, except in 2012. Many of these migrants leave again over time, but others stay. As a result, migration is currently the country’s main source of population growth.

The Netherlands is a dynamic migration society. It has received more than 150,000 immigrants annually since 2010, and more than 200,000 from 2015 onwards. In fact, the immigration record was broken every year between 2006 and 2020, except in 2012. Many of these migrants leave again over time, but others stay. As a result, migration is currently the country’s main source of population growth.

Most immigrants in the twentieth century came from a limited number of countries, primarily Turkey, Morocco, Suriname and the Dutch Caribbean.¹ Those days are long past, however. Nowadays they come from all parts of the world and have wide-ranging levels of schooling and reasons for moving. There are also substantial differences in the lengths of their stays.

A few examples, from different parts of the Netherlands, illustrate this. In Eindhoven – the heart of the Dutch ‘Silicon Valley’ – primary schools are currently dealing with a large influx of children of highly skilled Asian expatriates.² At one school, almost all pupils in the final year are of Dutch parentage but a third of those in the reception classes and as many as half in the nursery groups hail from abroad. By 2030 it is expected that Eindhoven alone will have almost 4000 schoolchildren from highly skilled migrant families. Similar patterns can be seen in other municipalities, too, such as Amstelveen and The Hague. Many of these children attend regular schools, either because international education is too expensive or has no room for them or as a deliberate choice by their parents. But their arrival presents schools with new challenges. For example, it is often unclear how long they and their parents will be staying in the Netherlands – some remain for only a few years, others for the whole of their primary schooling.

This new diversity comes on top of the existing ethnic diversity in Dutch society. Zorgpoli Haaglanden, in the Transvaal neighbourhood, is one of The Hague’s largest health centres. Of its 18,000 patients, 90% have a migrant background (first or second generation). In the past this usually meant Indo-Surinamese or Turkish, but these days the facility also has thousands of Polish patients who speak little or no Dutch. This causes frequent miscommunication and misunderstandings with medical staff, as a result of which the Haaglanden now employs a Polish-speaking GP, practice assistant, physiotherapist and pharmacy assistant as well as personnel with a Dutch, Indo-Surinamese or Turkish background. In all, its current employees speak fourteen different languages.³

How can governments manage the arrival of large numbers of very different migrants? That is the question at the heart of this study. Many different institutions are working hard to provide tailor-made education, healthcare and other services for all these different groups, but that requires a lot of extra effort on their part. People living in many Dutch neighbourhoods have long been used to the arrival of new migrants, but the great diversity of those now coming into the country is making conviviality increasingly complicated. In this study the concept of conviviality refers to the processes of living together and interaction between members of different groups that have become an ordinary feature of social life in a multicultural society.⁴

The main message of this report is that the government must pursue a more active and targeted policy to familiarize all new migrants with Dutch society and to facilitate conviviality between all these different groups. This is hardly a new theme, but we show that the changed migration patterns of recent decades require a thorough reassessment of the policy agenda.

Managing migration effectively is one of the major social issues of our time. And one with many dimensions to it. We do not pretend that this report deals with all of them – the theme is too wide-ranging for that – but instead confine ourselves to three core issues the government needs to address.

• 1. The scale of migration, its diversity by origin and levels of transience (temporary migration) are all increasing. These are structural changes that call for more systematic reception arrangements. The government has to create permanent facilities to help all migrant groups familiarize themselves with Dutch society. In this respect, more attention needs to be paid to the entire migration cycle from the moment of arrival up to and including the possible moment of departure.

• 2. Greater diversity by origin and shorter average stays are straining traditional patterns of social cohesion in some communities. This is not only the case in ‘classic’ socio-economically weak neighbourhoods, about which much has already been written, but also in ‘stronger’ ones now also facing increasing diversity and transience. This requires a more structured approach to social cohesion and intracommunity relations, especially on the part of local authorities.

• 3. Questions of social cohesion should also play a structural role in migration policy.

In this introductory chapter we first discuss the various forms of diversity related to migration and briefly elucidate the three core issues listed above. We then clarify the terminology used in this report, before explaining how it is structured.

1.1 Fourfold Increase in Migration Diversity

The above examples from Eindhoven and The Hague show how much diversity by origin in the Netherlands has increased and evolved in recent years. These changes take at least four forms.

1.1.1 Greater Ethnic Diversity

First of all, diversity by origin has increased. Most immigrants to the Netherlands in the last century came from neighbouring countries, from former Dutch colonies, from Morocco or from Turkey. Since the end of the Cold War, however, they have been arriving from all parts of the world. Figure 1.1 shows the top 15 countries of origin for net migration in the period 2008–2018. These no longer include the ‘traditional’ sources of twentieth century migration; in fact, net migration from them was actually negative during this decade – more people from these groups left the Netherlands than entered. As a result of these developments, the Dutch population at the beginning of 2017 comprised people from no fewer than 223 different countries of origin (see also Box 1.1).⁵

Fig. 1.1

Net migration: top 15 countries of origin, 2008–2018 (×1000; excludes migrants of Dutch origin)

* Persons from Eritrea who were born before its formal secession from Ethiopia on 24 May 1993 may be recorded as originating in Ethiopia

© WRR (2020) | Source: Statistics Netherlands (CBS)

Box 1.1: Shift in Perspective

In public debate and policy concerning people with a migrant background in the Netherlands, a ‘traditional’ system of classification is still widely used. However, this rough division into ‘former guest workers’ and ‘immigrants from former colonies’, with ‘Western’ and ‘other non-Western’ as residual categories, has long since ceased to provide a picture of the nation’s ethnic diversity. Today, the vast majority of Dutch residents with a migrant background in fact fall into the ‘Western’ and ‘other non-Western’ groups. Figure 1.2 shows the extent of diversity by origin when the old ‘postcolonial’ and ‘guest worker’ perspective is abandoned.

Fig. 1.2

Two different perspectives on the composition of the population with a migrant background in the Netherlands, as of 1 January 2017

© Jennissen et al. (2018) | Source: Statistics Netherlands (CBS)

1.1.2 Greater Diversity by Length of Stay

Secondly, there is greater diversity in lengths of stay. Here, too, a shift has occurred. Most immigrants from the former Dutch East Indies (now Indonesia), Suriname, Turkey and Morocco settled permanently in the Netherlands – even though many did not initially intend to do so. In recent decades, however, we have seen a considerable increase in temporary migration. We refer to this using the term ‘transience’. On average, moreover, immigrants in this category are now staying for a shorter period of time. Of all those settling in the three largest Dutch cities, Amsterdam, Rotterdam and The Hague, between 1995 and 1999, for example, almost 16% had left again after 2 years. By 2006–2010 that figure had risen to 27%.⁶ In other places the rate is even higher: major provincial cities saw almost 35% of new immigrants leave within 2 years and in so-called ‘expat municipalities’ (see below) the figure was almost 38%.

1.1.3 Greater Diversity by Motivation and Status

Thirdly, there is now more variety in people’s reasons for migrating and their socio-economic status. The ‘traditional’ immigrants from Morocco and Turkey were low-skilled workers, as are many of those now arriving from Poland, Bulgaria and Romania. But others from these countries and many from elsewhere in the European Union (EU) and from the United States, India and China are highly educated and first come to the Netherlands as students or to conduct PhD research before finding employment in information technology (IT) or the financial sector, or with one of the many international organizations and businesses based here. Others, such as Syrians, Somalis and Eritreans, arrive as refugees fleeing civil war and oppression. In addition, there are differences in legal status, religion, age and a wide range of other characteristics significant for the social position of migrant groups.⁷

1.1.4 More Geographical Diversity

One final aspect of migration-based diversity concerns the characteristics not of the migrants themselves, but of the places where they settle. Today’s newcomers are not distributed evenly across the country. And the same also applies to the ‘traditional’ migrant groups and their offspring. As a result, Dutch towns and cities vary widely in their ethnic make-up. Some are highly diverse, others host mainly members of one particular migrant group and others still remain almost exclusively ethnically Dutch.

The diversity of a community can be measured from the probability that two random residents meeting in the street will come from a different background. On the one hand there are places where this chance is relatively small: about one third of the Dutch populations live in a municipality (‘gemeente’) where the chance is less than 30%. On the other side of the coin are districts – many of them in the Randstad, the conurbation in the western Netherlands – where the odds are relatively high. In The Hague, Amsterdam and Rotterdam, for example, they are greater than 70%. Today, less than half of the residents of these cities come from a Dutch background; the majority have roots in a wide range of other countries. The same also applies increasingly to the suburbs of these three cities, such as Diemen, Rijswijk and Capelle aan den IJssel.

Even when they have a substantial migrant population in common, no two communities are the same in terms of that population’s composition. Horticultural districts such as Westland and Zundert, for instance, are home to a large numbers of migrant workers from central and eastern Europe. Former industrial towns such as Gouda, Leerdam and Hengelo, have many ‘traditional’ migrants from Turkey or Morocco. Highly skilled newcomers from Asia or the English-speaking world are concentrated in expat enclaves like Amstelveen, Wassenaar, Voorschoten and Wageningen. Border communities such as Kerkrade, Vaals and Baarle-Nassau are home to many Germans or Belgians. And some places – Urk, Grootegast and Staphorst, for instance – still have very few residents with a migrant background. These differences reflect the many different faces of diversity in the Netherlands, in this report we distinguish different types of municipality along the lines just outlined.

1.2 Three Important Issues

In this report we focus upon three core tasks for government. We discuss each in more detail in a separate chapter later, but below we elucidate them in brief.

1.2.1 Better Organization of Reception and Integration

One of the central messages of this report is that the reception of new immigrants must be better organized and structured. This is largely a task for local authorities and other local actors, such as schools, healthcare institutions and employers. In recent decades these actors have incorporated migrants from Suriname, the Dutch Caribbean, Turkey and Morocco, often by trial and error and with lot of effort on the part of teachers, employment officers, care providers, police officers and civil servants. Now that a mode has been found for these groups, however, new ones have appeared – Poles, Indians, Syrians, Eritreans and others – each with its own language, beliefs and customs. For them, too, a way has to be found to provide good care, education, work and security. This demands flexibility and empathy from the community and its institutions. And we have seen above with the example of Zorgpoli Haaglanden in The Hague, that is possible.

Local authorities sometimes have only limited insight into the arrival, presence and departure of migrants in their areas. Some are rather late in developing adequate social policies in response, only doing so when a specific group has settled locally. They then start organizing welfare, educational or housing services accordingly, but the reality of the new diversity means that those who tailor their provision to the migrant ‘groupe du jour’ run the risk of always lagging behind relevant developments. Various Dutch regions are experiencing a constant influx of ever-changing migrant groups, a phenomenon which requires more than an ad-hoc response.

Attention thus needs be paid to the entire migration cycle, from a point before arrival until the possible moment of departure. How can we ensure that migrants are properly received and given a good start when they first settle in the Netherlands? What facilities are needed for those who are here only temporarily? What forms of civic integration, basic and advanced, are appropriate for people who settle for a definite or an indefinite period of time? And how can governments facilitate smooth departures?

The new diversity comes in so many different forms and local variants that a national, one-size-fits-all response is just not going to work. The issues in border towns like Kerkrade and Vaals are simply too different from those in expat communities such as Wassenaar and Amstelveen. Provincial towns like Gouda and Tiel have to deal with groups quite unlike those coming to large cities like The Hague and Amsterdam. The situation in Utrecht or Eindhoven is barely comparable with that in Rotterdam or Almere. All this means that the reception and integration of newcomers have to be shaped primarily at the local level in order to align with the specific nature and characteristics of the local migrant population.

1.2.2 A New Agenda for Conviviality

Another key issue is conviviality. Large sections of the Dutch population are concerned that increased immigration is putting social cohesion under pressure. According to the Netherlands Institute for Social Research (Sociaal en Cultureel Planbureau, SCP,) ‘living together’ and ‘immigration and integration’ have for many years been two of the three principal national problems as perceived by the general public.

In the past, the policy challenge around migration was defined primarily as an issue of integration , the idea being that immigrants needed help to bridge their distance from Dutch society. In some places, such as medium-sized towns with one specific group of migrants, this remains an important policy matter. We argue in this report, though, that in communities and neighbourhoods with a high degree of both diversity by origin and transience, issues of conviviality also need to be addressed. Unlike policies of the past, which focused upon deprivation and multiculturalism, this approach involves society as a whole and not just specific groups of migrants. Issues of diversity and conviviality affect everyone, including economically successful migrant groups and also those with a Dutch background. Moreover, they are not a matter of restoring a lost unity but about seeking new forms of cohesion in a changing society.

Increasing diversity, by its very nature, reduces the risk of newcomers and established population groups forming disparate ‘blocs’. When a society has overlapping ‘cleavages’ and ethnic, religious, geographical, social and political differences between groups start to coincide, that may endanger social cohesion. But as the diversity of migrants in the Netherlands increases in terms of their origin, length of stay and socio-economic background, so the chance of such overlaps appearing diminishes. After all, greater diversity means that there are no longer a few relatively homogeneous population groups with a migrant background. This reduces the likelihood of clashing ‘us and them’ perspectives dominating the national stage and of differences between established populations and newcomers coinciding with differences in religion, language, regional identity and social status. For example, we find a huge variety of religions practised and languages spoken amongst ‘new’ migrants. Moreover, they vary widely in terms of their social background and do not form a homogeneous political bloc. The new diversity can thus mitigate some past concerns about segregation and polarization.

Nevertheless, this does not mean that conviviality will come about automatically. Rather than a risk of homogeneous bloc forming, there is instead the danger of fragmentation and polarization along ethnic lines. The presence of many different groups from wide-ranging backgrounds and cultures increases the chance of triggering sensitivities and mutual misunderstandings. A high degree of diversity by origin makes it more complicated to live together or side by side in neighbourhoods and communities. Earlier research we conducted shows that residents assess local community relations as less positive in neighbourhoods where diversity by origin is high.⁸ They feel less at home and are more likely to feel unsafe. These diversity effects come on top of existing problems around the integration of specific groups and are not related to the socio-economic composition of the neighbourhood; they are found in wealthier areas, too, and the greater feelings of discomfort and insecurity we identified affect residents with a migrant background as well.

Conviviality is also more difficult when there is a great variety in the length of time migrants reside in neighbourhoods and communities. When established residents constantly have new neighbours, this can cause isolation that weakens mutual relationships. International studies show that a higher degree of neighbourhood stability is associated with more local friendship networks and a lower degree with more crime.⁹ When there is a lot of transience, it is more difficult to form local networks so that people tend to live ‘in parallel’, are less likely to call each other to account for antisocial behaviour and experience more social disorganization.

In short, increased diversity of origin and greater transience make it more difficult for residents to recognize each other, to develop routines and to make contacts. These issues give rise to an important new policy challenge: how to ensure new forms of cohesion and intracommunity relations in diverse social environments. How do you make all residents feel at home in their neighbourhood and community? How do you equip housing providers, schools and voluntary associations to deal with a plurality of languages and cultures? And how do you maintain a vibrant civil society when its members come from many different backgrounds and, in many cases, move on so quickly?

1.2.3 Gearing Migration Policy to Social Cohesion

Finally, we look at the migrants of the future. Patterns of migration are not natural phenomena, but result from an interplay of institutional frameworks, changing circumstances, personal decisions and social networks. And to a certain extent government influence, through legislation and regulations. We therefore consider specifically whether social cohesion should play a role in migration policy.

1.3 The Idiom of This Publication

Few topics are so in need of precise definitions as the subject of this report. For that reason, we devote this section to some of the key terms we use. Note that the terminology in this English version reflects the specific Dutch situation, policy framework and idiom, and as such may differ from that current in other countries.

Unless otherwise stated, we here use the term ‘diversity’ to refer specifically to ethnic heterogeneity in the context of migration. In applying this restrictive definition, we acknowledge that elsewhere the term is often used in a broader sense and may there also encompass gender, sexual orientation or cultural preference, for instance. We also realize that it frequently has a strong normative orientation.

1.3.1 What Do We Mean by ‘Immigration Society’ and ‘Migration Society’?

In this report we use a demographic definition of the term ‘immigration society’. By that we mean a society in which a significant proportion of the population has a migrant background and where immigration is the main driver of population growth.

The Netherlands has met this demographic definition since the beginning of the twenty-first century. Nearly one person in four has a migrant background and their representation within the overall population will continue to increase in the coming years, reaching approximately one third in 2050.¹⁰ Migration is also having a major impact upon population growth; since 2015 net immigration has exceeded the birth surplus (the number of births per annum minus the number of deaths). In other respects, too, immigration is unmistakably the driving force behind population growth. This becomes apparent when we compare the respective birth surpluses of those with and without a migrant background: the former has been higher than the latter since 2002. And since 2015 there has actually been a mortality surplus in the ‘indigenous’ Dutch population: the number of deaths per annum has exceeded the number of births. In other words, without immigration the total population of the Netherlands would have shrunk. In the period 2020–2050, its size is expected to increase by almost two million people. But this growth will be confined solely to groups with a migrant background. We look at this in more detail in Chap. 2.

This does not mean that immigration is a feature of all parts of the Netherlands. As mentioned above, there is great diversity between – and sometimes also within – communities. A number of municipalities, especially in the north and east of the country, have hardly any residents with a migrant background.

We also speak of a ‘migration society’. This is a slightly broader concept, as it also includes emigration. We show in Chap. 2 that transience amongst migrants has increased. For instance, it is believed that three-quarters of newcomers to the Netherlands in 2010 have since left. They have either returned to their country of origin or moved on to somewhere else. Moreover, there are also people with a Dutch background who leave temporarily or permanently. This combination of immigration and emigration creates a high turnover rate within the total population.

1.3.2 What Do We Mean by Migrants?

The concept of migration is open to different interpretations. After all, people can migrate both within a country, between cities or regions, and internationally, from one country to another. In this report we only look at the latter.¹¹

But what makes someone an international migrant? The answer to this question has both a geographical and a temporal dimension. Geographically, one has to cross an international border.¹² But not everyone who does that is a migrant. Tourists, for example, clearly do not count.

In this report we adopt the definition used by Statistics Netherlands (CBS). This body, the official Dutch statistical bureau, regards someone as a migrant if that person intends to stay in the Netherlands for more than four months. That is the temporal dimension of migration. Incidentally, this definition excludes asylum seekers since they are not generally included in the national population register unless and until they have secured a residence permit and move out of reception facilities to a more permanent home. Only at this point do they become classified as migrants, specifically ‘asylum migrants’ (Box 1.2).

Box 1.2: Different Types of Migrant

In this report we distinguish between various types of migrant based upon the legal categories used in the Netherlands, which in turn are derived from a person’s formal motive for migrating. By that we mean the official reason why they decided to come to the country.

• 1. Labour migrants come to work. They range from low-skilled production workers to highly skilled professionals.

• 2. Family migrants come to form a family or to be reunited with close relatives. When a person from the Netherlands enters into a marriage, civil partnership or cohabitation agreement with someone living abroad who subsequently joins them here, that is migration for the purposes of family formation. When someone comes from abroad to join a partner or parents who have migrated previously, that is family reunification.

• 3. Asylum migrants come as refugees, for example due to fear of persecution or because they are fleeing an armed conflict.

• 4. Student migrants come to take a course of education. A large proportion of this group leaves again within a few years. In view of this generally very short length of stay, we do not deal with student migrants in any detail in this report.

The actual motives prompting people to migrate do not always correspond with the grounds on which they are admitted to the Netherlands. In many cases they have multiple motives simultaneously or successive ones over the course of time.

1.3.3 What Do We Mean by Migrant Background?

As well as ‘migrants’, in this report we also refer to people with or from a ‘migrant background’. Again, we here use the standard definition from Statistics Netherlands: someone with a migrant background is a person living in the Netherlands who has at least one parent born abroad. Most migrants in the Netherlands therefore have a migrant background, but many people with a migrant background are not themselves migrants. People with a migrant background who were themselves born abroad belong to the first generation; those born in the Netherlands comprise the second generation .

Statistics Netherlands determines country of origin as follows. Persons whose parents were both born in the Netherlands are considered to be of Dutch origin, irrespective of their own country of birth. All other persons are classified in the first instance according to the country of their own birth. If this is the Netherlands, as is the case for people with a second-generation migrant background, the country of their mother’s birth determines their country of origin. If that is also the Netherlands, the father’s country of birth is decisive.

1.3.4 Why Do We Use the Term Migrant Background?

In a previous publication, we examined whether it is useful and desirable to use origin-based classifications in research and policy.¹³ Doing so may have the undesirable side effect of magnifying differences between groups. But we also argued that drawing such distinctions may still be legitimate, subject to certain conditions. For example, it can be useful in detecting differences in health, educational outcomes and labour-market participation which make it possible to implement targeted policies. It can also be used to identify discrimination. One of the necessary conditions is that the distinction should not only be informative, but also as neutral as possible.

1.3.5 Why the Second Generation?

Is it useful and desirable to include the second generation? The argument against this is that the term ‘migrant background’ sets these individuals apart even though they were born in the Netherlands and therefore have a Dutch background in many respects. On the other hand, some of the detrimental effects of migration, such as linguistic or employment disadvantages, are by no means always limited to the first generation. We did consider only including those inhabitants of the Netherlands whose both parents were both born abroad in this report, since the literature shows that language deficiencies, for example, hardly ever occur if at least one parent has a Dutch background. This, however, would have made it too complicated to present the longitudinal trends in Chap. 2. Moreover, it would not have substantially changed our empirical findings. We therefore decided to follow Statistics Netherlands on this point.

Also in line with Statistics Netherlands, we have confined ourselves to the first and second generations. Figure 1.3 shows that the proportion of second-generation migrants is now quite large, particularly in the case of the traditional groups. The third generation – that is, the grandchildren of migrants, but with both parents born in the Netherlands – are thus counted as part of the population with a Dutch background.

Fig. 1.3

Top 10 countries of origin of persons with a migrant background, by generation (×1000)

© WRR (2020) | Source: CBS

1.3.6 How Do We Measure Diversity by Origin?

How can diversity by origin be measured? Dutch researchers and policymakers often consider only the percentage of the population with a migrant background, the percentage with a non-Western background or even just the percentage with a Turkish or Moroccan background. These are all highly problematic indicators. In the first and last cases, diversity is not in fact measured at all because they can also conceal a high degree of homogeneity. If a neighbourhood has a large number of residents with a migrant background from only one country of origin, then its diversity by origin is low.

We have therefore compiled a diversity index, the so-called Herfindahl-Hirschman Index (HHI), for all Dutch neighbourhoods, municipalities and regions. This produces a figure, between 0 and 1, indicating the probability that two randomly selected persons in the area in question belong to different groups by country of origin. The higher the figure, the greater that chance. A low HHI thus indicates considerable homogeneity, a high one considerable heterogeneity. The figure for the whole of the Netherlands is 0.38. In other words, the chance that two randomly chosen Dutch residents are from different ethnic groups is approximately 40%. In the three largest cities, where approximately 12% of the Dutch population lives, that probability is about 70% (that is, their HHI ≈ 0.7).

We included eighteen different groups in the HHI, using a geolinguistic classification of countries (or groups of countries) of origin or groups of countries. They were: Anglosphere countries, German-speaking countries, Scandinavian countries, Mediterranean countries, central and eastern Europe, Arab countries, Latin America, sub-Saharan Africa, south Asia, central Asia, southeast Asia and the Pacific, east Asia, the Dutch Caribbean and Suriname, Belgium, Indonesia (including the former Dutch East Indies), Morocco, Turkey and the Netherlands – the latter meaning that people of Dutch origin also count as a distinct geolinguistic group.

1.4 Outline

This report is in two parts. The first comprises Chaps. 2, 3, and 4 and provides a comprehensive description of the principal developments in migration to the Netherlands over the past half century and in policy towards it during that period.

• Chapter 2 offers an empirical analysis of the nature and scale of migration to the Netherlands and of its great diversity by origin, as well as shortening average duration of migrant stays.

• Chapter 3 shows that the new migration patterns are creating challenges related to social cohesion, which may vary at the local level.

• Chapter 4 outlines successive Dutch integration policy models and reveals its lack of coherence with migration policy.

The second part, Chaps. 5, 6, and 7, is more prescriptive in nature. It discusses the three major challenges identified in Sect. 1.2 and what is known about each of them from the research, before then moving on to make recommendations in Chap. 8.

• Chapter 5 considers how local authorities can ensure the proper reception and integration of all new migrants.

• Chapter 6 focuses upon strengthening social cohesion.

• Chapter 7 examines how migration policies can pay better heed to issues of social cohesion.

• Finally, Chap. 8 summarizes the most important findings of this report and suggests a policy agenda.