Tilburg, a city where everyone counts? The street tells a different story

Tilburg aims to be an inclusive city where everyone participates. It sounds good, but the harsh reality of the streets tells a different story. What are the limits of inclusivity? And is this pursuit even meaningful?

As you descend the stairs to the parking garage at Pieter Vreedeplein, you’ll notice the hanging neon signs with friendly faces welcoming you. ‘Smile, you’re in Tilburg,’ they say. During the day and early evening, the garage is bustling. People park their cars to go shopping, catch a movie, or visit a restaurant or café.

But if you set your alarm early and visit the garage at the end of the night, you’ll see a very different picture. Migrant workers sleep on the cold concrete floor, surrounded by plastic bags holding their few belongings. As daylight comes, they leave, heading to work. ‘Smile, you’re in Tilburg’ — does this apply to them as well?

Like many other Dutch cities, Tilburg wants to be inclusive. The city’s 2021 Inclusion Policy Statement is clear: ‘Tilburg wants to be an inclusive city, with healthy and happy residents.’ And: ‘A city where everyone feels at home, can participate, feels safe, and can contribute according to their abilities.’

The policy document for Tilburg’s 2022-2026 council period states that these principles have been translated into ‘actions and interventions.’ These include the creation of an anti-discrimination agenda, attention to street harassment, and funding for activities that promote dialogue through the Dialogue and Inclusion grant scheme.

All of this is still work in progress, and it’s too early to judge the effectiveness of these measures. However, it’s clear that the city of Tilburg is actively promoting inclusivity. And it’s not just the city government; inclusivity is also a buzzword in many businesses and social and cultural organizations.

And yet. You don’t need to descend into the parking garage at Pieter Vreedeplein to see the frayed edges of the inclusivity ideal. A walk through the city suffices.

Polish migrants and impoverished Dutch people collect plastic bottles and cans for the deposit money. Homeless people wander the shopping streets, asking for money. And what about the cleaners at the station pushing their carts? Or the traffic controllers guiding traffic through torn-up streets, ignoring the irritated glances of motorists? They have jobs, but do they truly feel embraced by the city? Do they belong to the ‘healthy and happy residents’?

One of the homeless people you might encounter in Tilburg is 52-year-old Werner. Born addicted, he was given up to an orphanage shortly after birth. His foster father systematically abused him. ‘My foster parents thought I was defective, and because they believed that, everything went wrong,’ Werner says.

After moving out on his own at 23, Werner managed to support himself for a while with various factory jobs. However, trauma, psychosis, and addictions eventually landed him on the streets.

Werner has been living a nomadic life for years now. He’s been imprisoned multiple times and has a criminal record. Even now, Werner is incarcerated in the Penitentiary Institution (PI) in Vught. When he’s released, the streets will be waiting for him again. He’s never been properly helped, Werner believes. He’s never felt welcome. Mostly, he’s been hunted and arrested.

More vulnerable people

‘Inclusion means accepting, respecting, and being open to others as they are. Through inclusion, we prevent isolation and separation from each other,’ says the policy statement. It sounds promising, but it remains difficult to imagine. Is inclusion a magical wand that brings people together—abracadabra? And do people like Werner fit into this picture? Or is it just a buzzword that will gather dust in a museum twenty years from now, something we’ll chuckle about? Oh, inclusion, so 2024!

What do we mean when we talk about inclusivity? The term cannot be separated from another concept: diversity. Diversity is a reality, the tangible result of a multicultural and individualized world. Inclusivity is the acknowledgment of this diverse reality, the conscious choice to embrace a multicolored society and ensure that no one is left out. Or as the Inclusion Policy Statement puts it: ‘Through inclusion, diversity works, and we enrich society by leveraging different insights and perspectives.’

Yet it seems that inclusivity must compensate for something, must heal a rift. Why does this diverse world not form a whole, and why are policymakers so eager to create unity—in varietate concordia? The desire for inclusivity seems tied to the decline of the welfare state.

Tilburg PhD candidate Wilma Numans sheds light on the ‘vulnerable’ in society in her dissertation Doing the Right Things Right: An Insider’s Perspective on Vulnerability. These are people who cannot meet the ideal of the self-sufficient citizen that has emerged with the introduction of the participation society.

‘How much inclusivity can we muster and tolerate? Is the cocaine-dealing street criminal as welcome as the Green-Left voting volunteer at the community center?’

To keep care affordable, the Netherlands has transitioned from a welfare state to a participation society over the past decade. Care has been placed more at the municipal level, closer to the citizen.

This places demands on municipalities and local care agencies, which must provide social security with less money, but also on citizens. According to Numans, citizens must become more self-sufficient and ‘must address and resolve their own vulnerabilities.’

In practice, this proves to be an unrealistic task for many. ‘Despite the government’s good intentions and its pursuit of an inclusive society,’ writes Numans, ‘research and actual figures show the opposite: since the introduction of the participation society, the number of ‘vulnerable people’ has not decreased.’

The pursuit of inclusion thus resembles putting band-aids where there was once strong and protective support. Numans emphasizes that the “insider perspective” is missing in the shaping of social policy. We like to talk about the people who need to be included, but we don’t talk with them.

Theory and practice don’t align well. As a result, the inclusive society risks becoming a paper reality—a dream flourishing in documents, policy papers, and notes but quickly turning into a fish out of water on the streets.

Or: it becomes more of a symbolic gesture. The rainbow crosswalk, the slavery monument, a public discussion evening — well-intentioned gestures that undoubtedly enrich the public space. But do they really contribute to reducing structural inequality and promoting social cohesion?

Moreover, inclusivity always seems easier to imagine along the lines of sexuality, gender, and race than along classic socioeconomic lines. You’d be hard-pressed to find a statue or parade for the unemployed, the Polish migrant on the assembly line, the lonely elderly, the repeat offender. It makes you wonder if the church of inclusivity has a hidden door policy.

How much inclusivity can we muster and tolerate? Is the cocaine-dealing street criminal as welcome as the Green-Left voting volunteer at the community center? Do we welcome a conservative fifty-year-old male Walloon migrant with the same open arms as a young progressive Moroccan woman?

Is one house where everyone is welcome really livable? As Dutch writer Arnon Grunberg noted in a column on diversity for VPRO: ‘It’s logical that in a Catholic church, Protestants are underrepresented or even entirely absent.’

Both feet in the neighborhood

If inclusivity is to work, you must continually engage with people. This is the experience of social worker Shirley van den Broek. She is active in the De Hasselt neighborhood for the social welfare organization Contour de Twern. There, people from many different cultures live, often struggling financially. It’s a typical neighborhood for a city like Tilburg, where the percentage of households receiving social assistance at 5.7% is still above the national average of 4.7%.

What strikes Van den Broek, herself the child of Indonesian migrants, is that residents often don’t know how to reach the municipality and vice versa. ‘Many residents of this neighborhood don’t have a good command of Dutch,’ she says at the De Poorten community center, housed in a converted church. This applies both to families with a migrant background and to native Tilburg families. ‘They don’t know how to navigate the municipality or other help agencies, and these often communicate in a language that’s too difficult for many residents. As a result, they drop out or become fearful. What if I ask for help but fill out something incorrectly? Will I be penalized?’

Shame also prevents many residents from asking for help. ‘In many cultures, it’s a disgrace when a man can’t support his family,’ Van den Broek knows. ‘And it’s taboo for the woman to provide the income.’ The result: isolation, often leading to alcoholism, domestic violence, and debt problems. Behind the facades of the houses in De Hasselt, much hidden suffering lies.

‘The suffering at the bottom of society doesn’t adhere to a nine-to-five mentality’

There’s no simple solution. But to help, says Van den Broek, you need to get into the neighborhood. Get to know the people, gain their trust. This takes time, requires a significant personal investment, and demands extensive knowledge of cultural customs and differences. It also requires the acceptance of these cultural differences and the will to help people who may have very different norms and values than you.

All of these are difficult to facilitate through short-term inclusion projects, Van den Broek warns. ‘They are well-intentioned and do help somewhat. But they always have a set timeframe and a limited budget, bound by strict conditions. And when the project is over, what then?’

The suffering at the bottom of society doesn’t adhere to a nine-to-five mentality, Van den Broek wants to say.

Not everyone is a saint

One person who knows this better than anyone is Hülya Özdemir, stepdaughter of the late Father Poels, who provided free bread to the poor in Tilburg for years on his bicycle. On behalf of the Broodnodig Foundation, she organizes the free distribution of food and clothing to the poor and homeless. This takes place at the ‘De Pollepel’ building in Wilhelminapark, a park traditionally frequented by many addicts and where Werner, 52, is often found.

Every afternoon, except on Sundays, a group of about one hundred to two hundred needy people gather at the gate of the building. On the courtyard, stalls are set up in a circle where food is distributed. From yogurt to vegetables, from pink cakes to bread. Everyone also receives a cup of soup and can browse through the piles of clothes.

No one has to prove they are poor, unlike at food banks. Whoever comes, gets something. The group shuffling past the stalls is remarkably diverse: elderly Tilburg residents, Polish migrants, single mothers, addicts, homeless people—all in various languages and colors. Ironically, you could say that the group outside the inclusive society is more diverse than the group that belongs inside.

According to Özdemir, this should come as no surprise. ‘Inclusion is the acceptance and tolerance of failure,’ she says firmly. ‘Of difference, of what falls outside the lines and frames.’ She adds: ‘Inclusive thinking is opening yourself up to what you don’t know and don’t even understand.’ And it is precisely this that she feels is lacking at both local and national levels. Inclusivity has become too much of a spreadsheet policy where not everyone fits in.

‘Look at the people who come here,’ she says. ‘Not everyone is a saint. But once you have a few scratches on your name, it becomes much harder to be accepted. Here at De Pollepel, everyone is genuinely welcome, and everyone is given something, no matter who you are or what you do.’

The food distribution, which takes about two hours daily, proceeds in calm and civility. ‘We never really have any trouble here,’ laughs a volunteer standing behind a crate of mozzarella. ‘We just treat each other like people.’

Let diversity be diverse

Let’s go back to basics. Inclusivity is inherently linked to diversity. It seeks to consciously embrace diversity, make it ‘work,’ and even strengthen it. For this to happen, differences must be accepted. A somewhat odd desire, as society simultaneously fears polarization, criticism, and debate.

You can’t open a newspaper without reading a warning somewhere that the country is dangerously hardening. Does inclusivity respect differences, or does it want to smooth over the wrinkles? And does it marginalize groups that don’t allow themselves to be smoothed over?

Paul Frissen, an emeritus professor of public administration at Tilburg University, focuses on analyzing the modern state. In his latest book, The Integral State, he takes a critical look at the state’s desire for unity. His book’s telling subtitle: A Critique of Cohesion.

‘Inclusivity is the enemy of difference, not the celebration of it’

According to Frissen, the road to hell is paved with good intentions. Modern government policy is characterized by an integrated approach meant to create cohesion in a fragmented society. There needs to be connection; different groups must come together.

But, argues Frissen, the world is fundamentally broken. And democracy exists precisely in the notion of difference. Attempts to create cohesion quickly lead to practices of normalization and totalization. One size fits all.

The same goes for inclusion, which, according to the professor, stands in direct opposition to diversity rather than perfecting it. The ideal of inclusion can even become ‘harmful,’ Frissen believes, ‘when it becomes policy, with criteria, categories, and systems.’ One thing it leads to: a large and expensive bureaucracy with endless paperwork.

Frissen takes issue with the fact that inclusion is always organized from a certain point of view. ‘It’s never neutral but always politically and ideologically charged.’ At the same time, it’s presented as if inclusivity is a universal value: good for everyone. And if you think otherwise, well, you may need to adjust your thinking until the penny drops. ‘Inclusion actually excludes,’ Frissen concludes. It is the enemy of difference, not the celebration of it.

It is not the state’s role to make policy according to its own ideas of the good life, Frissen argues. ‘When it comes to the state, I prefer narrow concepts over container concepts like inclusivity.’

Let the world be diverse, Frissen argues. He cites former Feyenoord captain Orkun Kökcü as an example. The footballer came under fire when he refused to wear the rainbow armband due to his religious beliefs. ‘Kökcü embodied diversity; the armband represented inclusion,’ Frissen laughs.

The right help

Frissen also paints a picture that when inclusion is rolled out from above over society, it does not have the desired effect. More than that: inclusion, contrary to its own intent, is not for everyone. It creates its own outsiders. You must already have certain privileges to be included in the ideal picture of inclusion. It starts with a good command of language and familiarity with the government.

For the migrants who sleep on the cold floor of the Pieter Vreedeplein garage, inclusion stays a distant reality. They have little choice but to go to work every morning, hoping that life will one day improve.

And Werner? He dreams of not having to return to the streets when his stay in the Penitentiary Institution ends. For once in his life, as he says, he would ‘like to be helped the right way.’ By being assigned a small room, a studio. ‘All I hope for is that people wish me a bit of luck.’

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