Do we need special, collective rights for immigrants and refugees in Western Europe?

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Abstract
Ethicists and political philosophers like Will Kymlicka and Charles Taylor have sensitized us to the need for recognizing the specific identity of minority groups. Once we stress the importance of group identities, the question arises how to protect those identities. Taylor and Kymlicka seek the answer to this question in granting special, collective rights to minority groups. In their analysis, Taylor and Kymlicka seem to have some specific, ‘historically settled’ minority groups in mind: the native Indian peoples of North America, and the French‐speaking community in Quebec, respectively. In my article, I want to examine whether this plea for special rights can be transferred to the Western European and, more specific, Dutch context. In this context, ‘minorities’ are not historically settled communities, but rather ethnic minorities, migrant workers and refugees, who have settled here only recently. Is it possible to maintain here, too, that special, collective rights are the best way to protect their identity? I shall answer this question in the negative. In the Western European setting, cultural pluralism may be best guaranteed by sticking to quite ordinary individual human rights. If these rights are implemented fully and effectively, we do not need special rights.

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