Naturalization and employment integration of Turkish and Moroccan immigrants in the Netherlands

Abstract

This article deals with immigrants’ naturalization decisions and their effects on socioeconomic integration. The research questions are the following: Is cultural integration of immigrants positively related to naturalization? Does naturalization exert a positive influence on the employment integration of immigrants in the Netherlands? Using data from the ‘Social position and Use of Public Facilities by Migrants’ (SPVA) survey for the year 2002, we concentrate our analysis on Turks and Moroccans. The results of multivariate analyses indicate that naturalization of Turks and Moroccans in the Netherlands is not positively related to cultural integration nor to employment integration. These unexpected findings can be explained by the Dutch rules on naturalization.