Surveying Ethnic Minorities

Abstract

More than half a million foreign residents, mainly from Turkey and Morocco, live in The Netherlands. The practice of Dutch research institutes is to include individuals of these groups in their samples only if they speak the Dutch language. It will be clear that consequently there is a lack of statistical knowledge about these residents. As the notion is growing that their stay is likely to be permanent there is an increasing interest for social research in this field. Many of the foreign residents originally came as temporary ‘guest workers’, but this post-war migration has resulted in the permanent settlement of substantial cultural and ethnic minorities in West European countries. In general this first generation (the people who came to Holland) has a poor educational and socio-economic level and there is also a great cultural distance between them and the Dutch community (see van den Berg-Eldering, 1978; Heijke, 1979; Shadid, 1979). Entzinger (1984) characterises the situation of many immigrants by three elements: (1) a weak legal status (often combined with insecurity of residence), (2) a socially deprived position, and (3) a different ethnic origin. Because of this last aspect the immigrant groups are sometimes referred to as ‘ethnic minorities’.