The home is all the rage. We see it in the media, where Ikea commercials and romantic movies remind us that there is no place quite like home; we come across it in the pamphlets of political parties that argue that ‘everyone should feel at home in the Netherlands’; and we see it all around us: everyone is trying to make themselves at home – in their house, in the neighbourhood, in the city, and in the nation. State policy is supporting citizens in this. Policy interventions and welfare projects ensure that citizens integrate, meet each other, begin to feel connected with one another, and identify themselves with the neighbourhood, the city and the country. In so doing, politics seeks to promote active citizenship and to encourage people to become involved in their neighbourhood, city and country – as if it were their own home.

These policies and social projects show that there is nothing noncommittal about feeling at home. Feeling at home is necessary and compulsory. There is, of course, the political hope that the quality of life in so-called ‘disadvantaged neighbourhoods’ will improve by increasing a sense of home among their inhabitants. Feeling at home and experiencing a sense of interconnectedness are seen as preconditions for a ‘good’ and livable neighbourhood and city. And successful neighbourhoods – characterised by sustainable, local networks of residents – are considered to be the building blocks of a sense of belonging at the national level.

More and more policymakers believe that the nation, the city and certainly the neighbourhood should feel like home to its residents. On the basis of this idea, politicians – in collaboration with welfare workers and local organisations – are calling upon residents to become actively involved in their ‘collective house’ by jointly countering deviant behaviour, by serving in neighbourhood committees, by participating in neighbourhood activities and by taking care of neighbours in need of help. The increased social control and social cohesion are meant to lead to a greater sense of security, more trust among residents and a livable environment that everyone can justifiably call their ‘home’.

A livable Netherlands is a country in which everyone feels at home – this is what is written in countless policy documents produced by rural and local politics and also in the ambitious plans of welfare institutions and neighbourhood organisations. But is that even possible?

Introduction

The past 25 years have witnessed a policy of deinstitutionalization for psychiatric patients and people with intellectual disabilities, both in the Netherlands and abroad. No longer banished to institutions in the countryside, the policy posits that it would be better for these people to once again be a part of society, to live in ordinary neighborhoods in towns and villages. While there would be additional support for these individuals, the idea was that they would live in their own houses (instead of institutions) as independently and autonomously as possible. Since the late 1990s, this policy has broadly been referred to as community care (Means & Smith 1998).

This chapter draws on the research project ‘Living in the Community? Community Care for Psychiatric Patients and People with Intellectual disabilities’ This project examines the effects of the policy of community care in urban renewal areas where many psychiatric patients and people with intellectual disabilities end up living (social housing, which these groups often depend on, is available in these neighborhoods). The focus lies in how psychiatric patients and people with intellectual disabilities living independently in these neighborhoods experience their new ‘homes’. Next to archival and literature research, we conducted extended interviews with around 100 people with different psychiatric or intellectual disabilities. The research took place in neighborhoods in three cities: Zwolle, Hilversum and Amsterdam – a mixture of smaller and larger towns in more metropolitan and rural surroundings.

After reviewing the criticisms of institutionalization, this chapter examines whether, and to what extent, the policy of deinstitutionalization has led to a sense of belonging in the neighborhood among psychiatric patients and people with intellectual disabilities. Why do we focus on ‘belonging’? What does ‘belonging’ have to do with the quality of life of people with psychiatric problems or intellectual disabilities in poor, deteriorated neighborhoods? Quite a lot, as it turns out. In the Netherlands in the 1970s, the main criticism of housing these individuals in institutions focused on their alienation and exclusion from society. As a result, living outside institutions became the dominant aim.