State Commission: discrimination occurs everywhere in the Netherlands

Discrimination is everywhere in the Netherlands, and not only isolated incidents but structural forms of discrimination which transcend stages of life, generations, and sectors. It results in people dealing with discrimination in school and also later in their job, concluded the State Commission against Discrimination and Racism based on existing reports and conversations that researchers had with experienced specialists and other stakeholders in different sectors.

The First Article of the Dutch Constitution guarantees that everyone is treated equally, but that is not the case in the Netherlands. According to the Commission, people are discriminated against for their religion, philosophy, political preferences, race, sex, disability, and sexual orientation. In all the studied sectors, the researchers found discrimination and racism: at the workplace, education, social security, police, healthcare, the housing market, sport, and culture.

Commission chairperson Joyce Sylvester finds the conclusion that discrimination is so deeply rooted in the Netherlands "shocking." While many people thought that discrimination was mainly based on ethnicity, it is now clear that it comes in many more forms, she says.

"We look down on each other as a society," Sylvester states. She finds it essential that Dutch people become aware of this. In her analysis, she refers to a description of a “seven-checker,” a person who has an increased chance of success because they can put a check mark beside specific attributes. The concept of the seven checks comes from a book by Joris Luyendijk.

He defined the seven characteristics as a straight, white male, with at least one parent born in the Netherlands and at least one highly-educated parent. This male has completed the VWO secondary school education for students wanting to enter an academic university, and then they complete a university degree.

The commission concludes that people are not always aware that they are being led by, or judged by these deep-rooted societal hierarchies. "And that means that we all have to deal with it because even the seven-checker who counts himself among the 'happy few' has a daughter who receives too-low school advice or a mother in a wheelchair who cannot get an adapted home."

To stop the widely spread discrimination, the commission wants it to be easier to file a complaint against the government so that they can work with it. "The government needs to decide which behavior is tolerable and which isn't to start a norm," Sylvester adds. According to her, the rest of the Netherlands will follow if the government gives the right example, as has happened with the women's quota.

Outgoing Minister of the Interior and Kingdom Relations Hugo de Jonge says that the findings are "something to think about," he wrote in a letter to de Tweede Kamer.

He called the commission's findings "valuable additional insights to existing research on the nature, extent, and causes of discrimination and racism." De Jonge will bring the results to the attention of government organizations to see if they can improve the existing policies.