Gender stereotyping in the Dutch asylum procedure:

1
Gender stereotyping in the Dutch asylum
procedure Independent men versus dependent
women

• Peter Mascini and Marjolein van Bochove
• Erasmus University Rotterdam, The Netherlands
• Faculty of Social Sciences
• mascini_at_fsw.eur.nl

2
Research questions

• To what extent do women still have a greater
  success rate in the Dutch asylum procedure than
  men after the introduction of both the gender
  guideline Women in the asylum procedure and the
  Aliens Act 2000?
• Are male claimants more likely to resemble
  independent, rational individuals and female
  asylum seekers dependent, caring family members?
• To what extent are traditional gender
  characteristics responsible for the greater
  success rate of women in the Dutch asylum
  procedure?

3
Traditionally gendered migration pattern

• Males
• Labor or asylum migration
• Single
• Arrival precedes wife and children
• Females
• Family reunification, family forming, female
  labor
• Married, with children
• Follows husband (with children)

4
Gender stereotyping and success rates in asylum
procedures

• Dependent family member (female refugees)
• Depolitization of flight motives
• Privatisation
• Emotionalization
• Victimization of patriachal domination
• Independent rational individual (male refugees)
• Prototypical political refugee
• Depolitization of flight motives
• Attributing economic flight motives
• Criminalization

5

• Assumptions
• The traditionally gendered migration pattern is
  reproduced in the asylum procedure
• The images associated with this pattern are
  responsible for the smaller success rate of men
  in the asylum procedure
• Hypotheses
• Male asylum seekers are more likely to apply for
  asylum without a spouse or children, are less
  likely to travel after their spouses to the
  country of destination and are more likely to
  originate from countries considered to be
  relatively safe
• This traditionally gendered migration pattern
  implies that male refugee seekers fit the image
  of a bogus or economic refugee in more
  respects, while female asylum seekers are a
  closer match to the image of defenseless
  victims. Therefore, female claimants have a
  higher success rate in de Dutch asylum procedure.

6
Data

• The information system of the Dutch Immigration
  and Naturalisation Service (Indis)
• The unit of analysis was asylum applications, not
  files
• Not cases where the sex of the applicant was not
  registered
• Not unmarried minors
• Not applications without substantial decision

7
Chance that applications for residency were
accepted or rejected by gender (N206,705)
8
Chance that applications for residency were
accepted or rejected by gender, per cohort
9
Explanation of success rate main effects (Log
Odds ratios (Bs), N161.897)
10
Explanation of success rate interaction effects
(Log Odds ratios (Bs), N161.897)
11
Conclusions

• Men have a smaller success rate in the Dutch
  asylum procedure than women because they are less
  often accompanied by a spouse or children, they
  are less likely to travel after their spouses to
  the country of destination, and they are more
  likely to come from countries considered to be
  relatively safe.
• This suggests mens chances for success are
  smaller because they fit the image of a
  calculating bogus refugee in more respects
  while female asylum seekers more closely match
  the image of a victim of patriarchal
  domination.
• Additional indications for this interpretation of
  the data
• Traditional role attitudes are already inherent
  in formal policy.
• Having kin and originating from a country
  considered to be unsafe is even more advantageous
  for men than for women.
• Men belonging to the category unsuccessful
  asylum seekers still have a much smaller success
  rate than unsuccessful women.

12
Policy implications

• It is understandable that interest groups will
  still call attention to the negative influence of
  stereotyping on female asylum seekers, but it
  would be even more obvious if they were to focus
  on the stereotyping of male asylum seekers.
• This does not require attention to
  gender-specific forms of persecution, but to a
  more general negative stereotyping of men by
  immigration officials.
• Why has the smaller success rate of men not
  provoked action thus far?
• Perhaps it offers fewer opportunities to
  exemplify the moral superiority of the West in
  regards to the South, than when it concerns the
  patriarchal domination of women.
• Perhaps the idea of male dominance is so deeply
  entrenched in western culture that the
  possibility is overlooked that perceptions of
  masculinity can also be detrimental to men.