Desirable Migrants: Neoliberal Governmentality and the Construction of the Expatriate in Dutch Migration Policy

Abstract

This work examines how neoliberal governmentality shapes the discursive construction of expatriates as bearers of economic and cultural capital within Dutch migration governance, as reflected in state discourse surrounding the Knowledge Migrant Scheme (kennismigrantenregeling). Focusing on this unusually liberal migration policy, it argues that contemporary Dutch migration governance operates through a neoliberal logic of selective inclusion, in which access to residency and rights is increasingly determined by perceived economic value. Through critical discourse analysis of key political and institutional state documents, I examine how salary thresholds function not only as gatekeeping criteria but also as symbolic markers of cultural legitimacy. Migrants who meet these thresholds are not only fast-tracked through the migration system, but the Dutch state also presumes them to embody desirable norms such as cosmopolitanism, entrepreneurialism, and self-sufficiency. This exempts them from the integration demands and scrutiny imposed on other migrant groups. Drawing on Foucault’s concept of neoliberal governmentality and Bourdieu’s theory of economic and cultural capital, this thesis demonstrates that Dutch migration policy does not simply exclude individuals based on race, religion, or national origin, but increasingly relies on economic capital as the primary filtering mechanism. In this framework, the Dutch state assumes high income to signal cultural compatibility, while constructing migrants without sufficient relevant capital as culturally deficient and subject to systemic exclusion. This thesis challenges the conventional division between economic and identity-based rationales in migration governance, arguing instead that under neoliberal logic, economic and cultural value are deeply intertwined. In doing so, it shifts attention away from the well-studied mechanisms of restriction and toward the often-overlooked logics of privileged inclusion.