Ethnic Hostility among Ethnic Majority and Minority Groups

ethnic groups (Statistics Netherlands, 2005) and research that relates distributions of educational
levels to the strength of the educational effect among dominant ethnic groups (Jaspers, 2008). An
accurate and detailed description of the educational integration of the four major ethnic minority
groups had been lacking so far though. The description of trends in educational integration was
therefore the topic of the fi rst chapter of Part 2. This subject was viewed from a dynamic and a
multi-ethnic group perspective: I not only investigated ethnic educational differentials at one
point in time, but focused on birth cohort trends in ethnic educational inequality as well. Moreover,
I compared ethnic educational differentials across the major ethnic groups in the Netherlands. The
next chapter of Part 2, Chapter 6, built on the previous one and here my aim was to explain ethnic
educational inequality. My theoretical point of departure in this chapter was the Breen-Goldthorpe
model (Breen & Goldthorpe, 1997; Goldthorpe, 1996, 2000). This model had been used mainly to
explain trends in class-based educational differentials and their stability. The model is formulated
in such a way that it should – at least in principle – be able to explain all kinds of educational
differentials. Chapter 6 thus investigated the tenability of the Breen-Goldthorpe model in a multiethnic
context.
Besides the presumed differential distribution of educational levels across ethnic groups,
a second reason to expect differential effects of education on ethnic hostility across ethnic groups
came from previous, mostly qualitative research which claimed that higher educated and also
otherwise seemingly well-integrated ethnic minorities express more, not less ethnic hostility
(Buijs et al., 2006; Werbner, 2001). Since the relationship between educational attainment and
ethnic hostility among ethnic minority groups had not been investigated before in a rigorous
quantitative manner, I made this my subject of the last chapter of Part 2.
Although Chapters 5 and 6 did not contribute directly to the answer of the core question
of this book, they do give a more complete picture of the integration of ethnic minorities in the
Netherlands. Part 2 investigates the educational integration of ethnic minorities (the fi rst two
chapters) and the cultural integration of ethnic minorities as expressed by a lack of opposition
to ethnically mixed relationships and a lack of identifi cation with the country of origin. A more
complete picture of the integration of minorities is offered than by looking at the cultural
dimension only. Moreover, the fi rst two chapters of Part 1 served as a foundation for one of the
arguments explicated in the last chapter of Part 2, Chapter 7, where I related ethnic educational
inequality to the strength of the educational effect across ethnic groups.
I will now proceed to discuss my conclusions for each chapter in a consecutive order,
briefl y recapitulating the research question and my expectations. Then I will summarise my main
results before moving to chapter-specifi c conclusions. For each part there will be a fi nal concluding
remark. Findings of both Parts 1 and 2 have profound implications for Ethnic Competition Theory
and Contact Theory, and give rise to new directions for future research. These implications and
new questions deserved a separate section. The present chapter ends with a summary of the main
messages of this book.
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