CAN A MINORITY RETAIN ITS IDENTITY IN LAW?confronted not by individual Muslims or immigrants but by Muslims or immigrants who
act collectively in the public arena and invoke their fundamental rights.
In such circumstances it is sometimes easier simply to insist that you are the ‘‘major-
ity’’ and to demand that ‘‘people either adapt to our ways or leave the country.’’ This
adaptation is, in fact, not as easy as it sounds. It is no longer just about our laws and
rules—which ethnic minorities and Muslims should (rightly) observe—or about the
norms and values that people should know and, preferably, share (even if this has never
been the case in the Netherlands). Now it is also about whether or not people subscribe
to a new Dutch identity—the ‘‘mono-identity’’ observed by Kennedy—as opposed to
ethnic and religious identities that are incompatible with it. This excludes rather than
includes large groups of individuals in the Netherlands, and people do not stop to con-
sider whether this has a positive effect on Dutch society as a whole. The mirror image of
this trend can be seen in some members of the ethnic minority and Muslim communities:
they are withdrawing more and more into their own groups and undergoing a process of
radicalization.
In such circumstances, the question no longer concerns what a minority can do in
law: instead, it concerns what a majority can demand of a minority in the sense of adapta-
tion and integration. It is important to realize that questions about adaptation and inte-
gration will produce different answers both in the case of the so-called majority and in
the case of the different minorities in the Netherlands. It is also important to realize that
there is no consensus between majority and minority, no consensus among ethnic minor-
ity groups or within ethnic minority and Muslim groups, or even within the so-called
Dutch majority, and no consensus about Dutch identity or the direction in which Dutch
society should move. Hence the enormous confusion and the shrill tones in which the
debate is conducted.
Future Scenarios
We must bear in mind that, ultimately, it is the majority (or rather the behavior of the
majority) that determines how far minorities are integrated into a society and not the
reverse, as is sometimes thought.^19 Ultimately, the majority must create room for this—or
not, as the case may be. In either case, we are responsible for the consequences. It is
always about ‘‘us’’ and not about ‘‘them,’’ and in many cases ‘‘them’’ means ‘‘us.’’
We must ask ourselves the following questions:
- What form should a new Dutch identity take? Is it to be tailored along enlightened
lines? Is this identity to be inclusive or exclusive of all individuals and groups resident
in the Netherlands? - Will minorities, if they are unwilling or unable to join the ‘‘majority,’’ retain a place
withinsociety as a minority, but with equal rights and duties and respect for the fact
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