Scheffer studied philosophy, sociology and political sciences. In the 1980’s worked as a press correspondent in Paris and Warsaw. In 1986 took up work at the Wiardi Beckman Institute, think-tank for the Dutch social-democratic group Partij van de Arbeid (PvdA). Scheffer remains an influential member of the PvdA. Since 1992 he has been publishing in the Dutch press, mostly in “NRC Handelsblad” newspaper, and in the foreign periodicals: “Die Zeit”, “Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung”, “Le Monde des Debats”, “El Pais”, “Politiken” or “Tagesanzeiger”. Scheffer is concerned mostly with the issues touching upon the model of multicultural Europe, migrations, integration with the open society or the redefinition of the civic community. His latest book is Immigrant Nations (Cambridge, Polity, 2011).
Paul Scheffer
Nov. 8, 2011, 1:55 p.m.
Paul Scheffer is professor of European Studies at the University of Tilburg. From 2003 till 2011 he was professor of urban questions at the University of Amsterdam. He won renown with the essay The Multicultural Disaster (2000). In this book Scheffer dissolved the Dutch myth of the open society in which coexist the members of various religions and traditions.