Abstract
In order to investigate questions about the assimilatory or liberal nature of obligatory integration measures for immigrants in Europe, this article systematically analyses and compares the content of citizenship tests in Austria, the UK, Germany, the Netherlands and the USA. Based on a two-dimensional classification of citizenship test questions – along 14 thematic and two normative categories – the analysis has produced a surprising result: no hypothesis from the existing citizenship and civic integration literature can explain the content of all five citizenship tests. Furthermore, I find that the characteristics of a citizenship policy regime are not a good predictor for the content of the respective citizenship tests. In the sample, countries renowned for having an ethno-cultural understanding of citizenship implemented citizenship tests conveying a politically liberal idea of a community of citizens, united around legal and political norms, rather than around sociocultural ones. By contrast, the Netherlands – a country with a liberal and multicultural reputation – also requires immigrants to be aware of and accept certain sociocultural norms.
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