When spreading out refugees, offer a real perspective to integration “in the region”, claim LDE GMD's Maria Schiller, Elina Jonitz, and Peter Scholten.
Words by Elina Jonitz, Maria Schiller, and Peter Scholten and originally captured on Trouw.
State Secretary Eric van der Burg (Justice and Security) is in a hurry to spread the number of asylum seekers. But the question of whether he can force municipalities to receive asylum seekers overshadows the important question of whether this is also good for the long-term integration of recognized refugees. If they cannot move on to housing, work, and education, the solution to one problem may immediately create a new problem.
In recent decades, integration has often been a matter for large or medium-sized municipalities, but now there is a need for a clear perspective on refugee integration 'in the region'.
Distributing refugees does not automatically lead to better opportunities for integration. The Distribution Act is mainly driven by a crisis mode: shelter is the first concern, and everything else is a later concern.
Industrial areas
Small and medium-sized municipalities increasingly play a role in crisis relief, something we also see in neighboring countries. This concerns, for example, reception on industrial sites, abandoned holiday parks in the woods, or in abandoned hotels such as in Tubbergen. There was strong resistance when Van der Burg forced the municipality to provide asylum.
Dispersion also often leads to asylum seekers being pumped around between different locations in the country.
All this often complicates the long-term integration of refugees. Especially because practice shows that contact with society is very important. This already plays a role during the often lengthy procedures in the overburdened Dutch asylum system – where we can assume that a significant group will eventually be recognized as refugees. Think of the (limited but available) opportunities for asylum seekers to perform (volunteer) work in the local community, but also the many volunteer initiatives for asylum seekers.
This applies even more, once recognized refugees want to move on to that society. Some prefer to settle in large cities, but refugees often prefer to continue living in the environment in which they have already settled. Moreover, research among small and medium-sized municipalities shows that local communities prefer to take in refugees with whom they have already made contact.
Traveling Circus
In fact, no one benefits from a traveling circus in which both the asylum seeker and society cannot bond. Yet there is often a fear that premature thinking about integration could actually frustrate the admission process. Because if you start integrating before you're allowed in, return would be compromised, is the thought. Conversely, dispersion leads to a missed opportunity for integration.
That is why we should systematically take local possibilities into account when spreading. Together with municipalities and local organisations, look at where, how and to what extent childcare can be embedded in a particular social environment. For example, involve school umbrella organisations, sports associations, housing corporations, and business organizations in the development of childcare. In this way, reception becomes an opportunity for municipalities, instead of just a requirement.
Closed curtains
Such an approach also prevents the development of strong boundaries between 'us' and 'them' at the local level, especially in regions where there may be less experienced with migration diversity than in large municipalities. Integration remains a reciprocal process, in which small and medium-sized communities will also grow towards the migratory diversity that is often already an everyday practice in larger cities. If we don't want gated communities – closed communities – in cities, we shouldn't let people disappear behind closed fences or closed curtains in small municipalities either.