Rotterdam’s Superdiversity from a Historical Perspective (1600–1980)

This chapter analyses the major trends in Rotterdam’s migration history in three periods: the early-modern period (1600–1800), the era in which the Working Class Port City was created (1850–1940), and the post-war period until the 1980s. Rotterdam’s pre-industrial history convincingly reveals a multi-ethnic and religious diverse society. Small foreign minorities could have a significant influence on Rotterdam’s cultural, political and economic development. Even strong national identities did not restrict a strong sense of local attachment. The port city of the nineteenth century was less diverse, considering the smaller number of foreign migrants that settled in the city. The migration narrative of the port city in this period is inexorably linked to that of the working city. This narrative became highly popular in the post-war reconstruction period. The offspring of Rotterdam’s nineteenth century rural-urban migrants had rebuilt the city after the fatal German bombardment in May 1940 and had been responsible for its successful post-war industrial port development. The arrival of non-Western migrants in the 1960s and 1970s challenged Rotterdam’s nineteenth century popularised migration narrative. Policy-makers have suggested that this post-war migration process is fundamentally different from older migration patterns. In general, we tend to be too pessimistic about the post war integration and too optimistic about patterns of integration in the past, particularly during the nineteenth century. Notwithstanding the fact that by then the large majority of the migrants were Dutch, marginalisation and exclusion took place on a larger scale than realised. Our long-term perspective hopes to contribute to link earlier migration narratives to Rotterdam’s recent superdiversity.