Han Entzinger studied sociology in Leiden, Rotterdam and Strasbourg and is now Professor of Migration and Integration Studies at Erasmus University Rotterdam. From 1986-2001 he held a position as Professor of Social Sciences at Utrecht University. Earlier, Entzinger worked inter alia for the International Labour Organisation in Geneva and for the Netherlands Scientific Council for Government Policy. He has published extensively on migration, integration policies and inter-ethnic relations and has acted as a consultant on these issues to various governments and European organisations.

From 1994-2002 he was President of the Research Committee on Migration of the International Sociological Association. He now serves on the advisory boards of several research institutes, such as the Netherlands Interdisciplinary Demographic Institute (NIDI), the International Institute for Social Studies (ISS) and Netherlands Statistics, all in The Hague, and the Wissenschaftszentrum Berlin.