Burden, benefit, gift or duty? Dutch mayors’ framing of the multilevel governance of asylum in rural localities and cities in Zeeland

Sara Miellet*

*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Contribution to journalArticleAcademicpeer-review

Abstract

This article engages with critiques of multilevel governance (MLG) perspectives on asylum governance andidentifies two additional points of concern. First, it highlights the importance of empirically groundingreflections on the limits of the MLG approach, beyond the activism of city actors, by examining localasylum dynamics from the vantage point of mayors inrural and small urbanmunicipalities. It examineshow Dutch mayors in rural and small urban municipalities in the Dutch province of Zeeland experiencedand framed asylum governance in a multilevel setting between 2015 and 2016. Second, this articlebrings into focus internal dynamics, interactions between mayors and municipal actors within themunicipality, alongside external interactions and pre-existing local and regional challenges, such as ruralcrisis. It argues that even in the context of cooperative modes of governance, mayors navigate variouschallenges. In terms of framing, this article shows how mayors in this multilevel context commonlyframed municipal involvement in asylum governance as a duty rather than as a burden or benefittotheir localities. It argues that this framing reflects a local‘politics of consensus’rather than‘localpragmatism’
Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)426-444
Number of pages19
JournalTerritory, Politics, Governance
Volume10
Issue number3
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 4 May 2022

Bibliographical note

Funding Information:
‘Cities of Refuge’, a five-year research project funded by the Netherlands Organization for Scientific Research, explores and explicates the relevance of international human rights, as law, praxis and discourse, to how local governments in Europe welcome and integrate refugees ( https://citiesofrefuge.eu/ ).

Funding Information:
This study was supported by the Netherlands Organisation for Scientific Research [grant number 453-16-001: ‘Cities of Refuge: Local Governments and the Human Rights of Refugees in Europe’] awarded to Professor Dr Barbara Oomen. Thanks to all those who gave their time and shared their ideas on this research. Special thanks to Jasper Valent and Barbara Oomen for their collaboration, constructive comments and support. This paper has also benefited enormously from the suggestions of two anonymous reviewers and the constructive commentary of Els de Graauw, Andrea Pettrachin, Marieke de Wilde, Moritz Baumgärtel, Tihomir Sabchev and Elif Durmuş–my thanks to you all.

Publisher Copyright:
© 2021 The Author(s). Published by Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group.

Keywords

  • asylum
  • forced migration
  • framing
  • mayors
  • multilevel governance
  • rural crisis

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