The dispersal law to further distribute asylum reception was called a “major problem” for the cabinet formation in The Hague this week by PVV leader Geert Wilders. But would people in the country, who may soon have asylum seekers housed nearby as a result of this bill, also have such a big problem with it?
Perhaps in advance, given the protests against the arrival of asylum seekers' centers and crisis shelters in recent years. Such as the resistance in Heesch in Brabant in 2016 against the arrival of an asylum center with 500 asylum seekers: with a tied up dead pig, a mountain of sand on the mayor's driveway and a bulletin board in front of the town hall. In the end there was no asylum centre.
Less radical right
Where refugees are received, many people have no problem with it, according to research from Tilburg (2022). The researchers compared the experiences of residents of asylum seekers' centers and crisis shelters with a control group during the period 2011-2016, the years with the major refugee crisis. People near an asylum center became more positive about ethnic diversity. And their preference to vote on the radical right, such as for the PVV or FvD, fell by almost 5 percentage points compared to people who did not have asylum seekers in their area.
“Quite a big difference and statistically significant,” says professor of behavioral economics Sigrid Suetens, one of the researchers from Tilburg. “You also see in other studies that there is some kind of commonality it is found that something like empathy arises.”
The research confirmed the well-known 'contact hypothesis' from psychology: direct contact between minority and majority groups can reduce prejudice.
And that is important, according to the State Commission for Demographic Developments 2050, which published a thick report on population growth this week. “Polarization of society over migration makes society vulnerable,” it says. And the hardening of society fuels “radicalization and extremism, on several sides.”
The message from the State Commission: The Netherlands must slow down population growth by limiting migration, but migration will also remain necessary in the future. For the knowledge economy and “the most painful labor market shortages in vital sectors”, such as healthcare. And for economic growth, which is necessary to keep public facilities affordable.
“Regardless of the scale of migration, Dutch society will have to relate to migrants and, conversely, this also applies to the newcomers themselves,” the State Commission said. In different demographic scenarios, the percentage of people with a migration background among the population in 2050 varies between 26 and 45 percent.
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Opposition to immigration
How big is the support in the Netherlands for permanent migration? At this moment, in 2024, the attitude towards migration seems to be changing more and more people are outspokenly negative. The PVV became the largest party for the first time, and arranging reception for asylum seekers proves so difficult that a dispersal law is needed to force municipalities. Nearly 59 percent of the Netherlands is concerned about how migration changes the composition of the population, Clingendael research for the State Commission showed.
But studies also show that people do not think clearly about 'migration'. Firstly, younger generations are slightly less concerned about the multicultural society, as is also evident from the Clingendael study. Among the group of 18-24 year olds, 39 percent had concerns about this, and among 25-34 year olds it was 43 percent.
Young people less concerned about multiculturalism
This appears to be a structural, permanent change, writes professor of sociology and migration researcher Hein de Haas How migration really works (2023). Perhaps precisely because of increased migration, he suggests. Or because younger generations are likely to see more of a connection between racism and the history of colonialism and slavery.
Opposition to immigration is greatest among “older white social conservatives with lower incomes and education levels,” writes De Haas. These groups often feel abandoned by political elites: inflation and housing shortages hit them hardest, and technical developments threaten their jobs the most. Highly educated city dwellers with a good income are on average more positive about diversity.
People also think differently about different groups of migrants. Nearly two-thirds of the participants in the Clingendael study find limited labor migration acceptable. There is also understanding for limited asylum migration, study migration and family reunification; only the arrival of illegal immigrants in the Netherlands is massively rejected (86 percent).
“Many people are not simply for or against migration, but combine considerations,” says Professor Jaco Dagevos, special professor of integration and migration and SCP researcher. “You can be in favor of receiving real refugees, and also be very concerned about integration and the possibilities for reception.”
Registration centers and asylum seekers' centers
Racism, xenophobia and discrimination exist and are real problems, De Haas writes in his book. But according to him, it is mainly “the inflammatory rhetoric of opinion makers, politicians and the media” that negatively affects the image of immigration, not the increased immigration itself.
The influence of politics and the media is “enormous”, Dagevos also thinks. “Take the discussion about local shelter. At an asylum seekers' center, residents and municipalities think: then we will get the same thing here as in overcrowded Ter Apel. But that is a registration center, while the nuisance around asylum seekers' centers is often not too bad.”
A relatively small group of asylum seekers (350 per month out of 27,500 asylum seekers) in COA locations does cause persistent nuisance due to antisocial and criminal behavior, the Justice and Security Inspectorate reported in a report in 2021. These were mainly young men from 'safe countries', such as Morocco, Algeria, Libya and Tunisia, often with an addiction or a psychiatric illness.
But in general, reception in asylum seekers' centers does not lead to major problems, researchers from the University of Groningen concluded in 2019. People who lived close to an asylum seekers' center were more positive about asylum seekers than people who lived far away – comparable to the study from Tilburg. The resistance to asylum seekers therefore appears to be related to a broader “dissatisfaction” with the state of the country, the researchers concluded. “Protests against asylum seekers' centers, or, as is now the case, against the housing shortage or the nitrogen policy, are actually aimed at the failure of politics, administration and the media,” says professor of social psychology Tom Postmes, one of the Groningen researchers.
One way to increase the acceptance of migrants is to improve reception, thinks professor of migration and diversity policy Peter Scholten. “An overcrowded Ter Apel gives the impression that a prosperous country like the Netherlands cannot handle it all. In that sense, the dispersal law seems to be a necessary intervention, which can normalize asylum migration in the long term, especially in the case of smaller-scale reception. But the local community must be involved, and the reception must be followed up with housing, education and employment. The atmosphere of crisis must be abolished.”
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