Mens & Maatschappij - Volume 94, Issue 2, 2019

Ethnic discrimination in the Dutch labour market: Differences between ethnic minority groups and the role of personal information about job applicants

In this study, we present the results of a large-scale field experiment on ethnic discrimination in the Dutch job market. We sent fictitious job applications (N = 4,211) to vacancies for jobs in ten different occupations in the Netherlands. By examining 35 different ethnic minority groups, we detect considerable differences in discrimination rates between western (discrimination rate 1.2) and non-western minorities (discrimination rate 1.4). Furthermore, we find little systematic variation in discrimination with regard to gender, regions, and occupations, pointing to the existence of an ethnic hierarchy that is widely shared among employers. Finally, we do not find empirical support for the hypothesis that adding personal information in job applications reduces discrimination.

Everyday sexism and Islamophobia in Ghent: a situation test

People can experience everyday discrimination based on a number of characteristics. In this study, there will be a focus on everyday discrimination based on gender and religion. The interaction between gender and religion is the most current within Islam, therefore, the intersectional relationship between sexism and Islamophobia will be studied. A situation test was designed which was non-paired (random assignment) and has been performed 807 times. Test persons with three different profiles (a white male without an Islamic symbol, a white female without an Islamic symbol and a white female with an Islamic symbol) asked coincidental by-passers (white males without an Islamic symbol) if they could use their phone to send a text message. The results show that the white female without Islamic symbol have odds that are 6.0 times as high for experiencing that the request is granted, odds that are 5.1 times as low for experiencing that the by-passers do not physically give the phone and odds that are 3.2 times as low for experiencing doubt before the request is granted in comparison to the white male without Islamic symbol. The differences in responses were not significantly different between the white female with Islamic symbol and the white male without Islamic symbol. Benevolent sexism (towards the white female without Islamic symbol) and Islamophobia (towards the white female with Islamic symbol) are present.

The cosmopolitan citizen in a world of fading boundaries: a research on the migration aspirations of the Dutch and Flemish that have settled in Morocco

Within the scientific literature on migration, there is a seemingly strong emphasis on migrants who migrate to countries that are wealthier than their country of origin. Literature regarding the phenomenon of people moving to countries less wealthy than their country of origin is scarce. Therefore, the focus in this study is on Flemish and Dutch people (without Moroccan background) who migrated to Morocco with the main objective of finding out the reason for their migration. The model of Timmerman, Hemmerechts and de Clerck (2014) takes centre stage, the aim of which is to identify factors on the micro-, macro- and meso-level which influence the individual perception on migration. This study is based on secondary data analysis of 27 interviews with 21 individuals and 6 couples. At the micro-level, the love for a partner, the love for Morocco, the preference for the climate, and the presence of the so-called cosmopolitan identity are important factors in the creation of migration aspirations. On the macro-level the economic context (mainly because of a reduction in maintenance costs) is the most important reason to move to Marocco. The migration literature is increasingly focusing on the meso-level in which the social network of the migrant is most important. Most salient is that factors at the meso-level have hardly had any influence on the creation of migration aspirations for these interviewees. The identified factors on the micro-level and macro-level are in line with the fledgling theory Lifestyle Migration. Further research could indicate if the above-mentioned results comply with migrants who move to other non-traditional migration countries.