| Abstract: | In The Netherlands, since 1996, 'newcomers', like migrants, refugees and asylum seekers, are obliged to take part in an educational settlement programme which should enable them to gain access to (professional) education and to the labour market. This paper deals with the settlement efforts that are required from adult education on the one hand and newcomers on the other hand, and with the current results and further prospects. We elaborate the central aspects of the settlement policy and its developments, and, drawing on the field theory of Pierre Bourdieu, we analyse the settlement policy and its consequences for adult education as well as newcomers. Then we turn to the two ideologies, cultural assimilation and structural integration, which firmly instigated the (re)formation of the policy, and we relate them to the actual settlement practice. Conclusively, we stipulate three kinds of conditions for a settlement policy that has greater significance for the labour participation of newcomers, and for their integration in Dutch society in general. |
