Explaining Germany’s refugee policy change in 2015 in comparison with the Netherlands

This research explores the extent to which Kingdon’s Multiple Streams Framework (MSF) explains the difference in the asylum policy approaches of Germany and the Netherlands during 2015. Both countries had been conducting restrictive asylum policies during the past 20 years. However, in 2015, at the peak of the European refugee crisis, Germany abruptly transformed its approach to refugees into an open-door policy while the Netherlands continued with its restrictive approach. This led to a remarkable difference in the number of asylum seekers both countries received in 2015; a divergence which served as a point of departure for this research. This paper mainly focuses on the case study of Germany’s asylum policy.