The Dutch election results; bad news for Europe
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Written by Veronique Swinkels
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Monday, 27 November 2006
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 EDITO - The Dutch have chosen to continue their shift towards a more inward-looking attitude. Their choice stands for nostalgic old-burgher values and a conservative provincial lifestyle. The more cosmopolitan and outward looking part of the country has lost. The election results, and the attitude towards Europe during the election campaign, are bad news for Europe. There are three reasons for this; the winners are not at all in favour of Europe, the losers will be too busy with their own power struggle and the Dutch political elite have showed no vision on Europe. A little background so you understand a bit more about Dutch politics
The Dutch parliament has 150 seats. In the new parliament 10 parties will be represented. This years winners are the Socialist Party (SP, form 9 to 26 seats) and the right wing Party of the Freedom (PvV, form zero to 9 seats). Another winner is the middle of the road Christian Party, the Christian Union (Christen Unie, from 3-6 seats), and the (single issue) Party of the Animals (Partij van de Dieren, from zero to 2). The Christian Democrats remain the largest party but lost 4 seats (CDA, from 44 to 41 seats). The big losers are the labour party (PvdA, from 42 to 33 seats) and the liberal party (VVD, from 28 to 22). The democrats, who were part of the government and who caused this government to fall a couple of months ago, lost heavily as well (D66 from 6 to 3 seats). The Greens who position themselves as social liberals lost a little (Groen Links from 8 to 7 seats). And to complete the landscape there is the reformed protestant party (SGP), a conservative Christian party who have had 2 seats for many years now. The winners are not in favour of Europe
The real winners of these elections are the SP and the Party of the Freedom (PvV). Although left wing, the SP stands for nationalism and isolationism. Their charismatic founder Mr Marijnissen is a former maoist. He is an excellent speaker and manages his party with an iron grip. The majority of their voters live in the provinces of Holland. Social security is their main theme. Their election program tells us they want the development of Europe to stop here and now. Foreign policy, terrorism and military decisions should stay as much as possible at the national level. Their main concern is the loss of autonomy over issues on social security and the effect Europe has on the liberalisation of the public sector. Their voters form an important part of the no-voters of the EU referendum. The Party of the Freedom is a right wing party founded by Mr Wilders a former liberal who left de VVD because he thought them much too soft on immigration and he disagreed with their point of view on the EU-membership of Turkey. He campaigned to close the borders for all non western immigrants and his election program tells us he wants to stop the increase of responsibilities of the EU. And he wants the Dutch to leave the Schengen-area so Holland can define its own immigration policy again. The losers will be too busy with their own power struggle
The country is divided to the bone and there are not many natural coalitions to be made to form a stable government. Mr Balkenende will probably continue his leadership. But he lost his favourite ally the VVD as an obvious first choice. Together they will need the cooperation of many small parties to form a majority. And each small party will have its price at the negotiation table. This will probably not be his choice as he had a very bad experience with D66, the small party he needed for a majority in his former cabinet. The most logical combination on paper would be a middle/left majority with CDA, PvdA and SP. But from the point of view of characters this is a real challenge. All the experts agree it will take quite a while before this government will be formed. And on top of this, more bad news for Europe, is the fact that the liberals are very weak at the moment. They were always an important advocate of a strong Europe. The VVD, the party of the hardline Dutch immigration minister Verdonk, was not rewarded for its choice for the more liberal party leader Mr Rutte. For your information Mrs Verdonk was his opponent for leadership of the party. This battle between the progressive liberals and the conservative liberals left the VVD powerless and divided during the election campaign. At the end of the campaign the VVD tried to harden their line by proposing a ban on burkas and calling for a stop on the EU-negotiations with Turkey. But all this did not do them any good. They lost 6 of their seats and their right wing voters went to Mr Wilders. The political elites have no vision about Europe
The political elites in Holland have either no vision on Europe or are afraid to be outspoken about it. Afraid to be touching a sensitive issue and to loose voters over that. But what has become clear in these elections is that the parties with a clear view have won and the larger parties who tried to accommodate everybody lost. There was very little mention of Europe in the election programs. And during the election campaign Europe was non existent. Europe was no issue what so ever. No political party used it to differentiate from the others. The topics discussed were extremely national. None of the parties made a strong case for a new European constitution or proposed a clear view on how this constitution might look. Holland missed an opportunity here. As a small country there is so much reason to be ahead of the troops and be explicit about what Europe you want. Election campaigns provide the parties with the opportunity to make their visions clear. And the election results legitimize the parties to pursue this direction. The whole essence of informing the voters about the main issues at stake and preparing them for the next steps was neglected. The parties completely forgot to take their responsibility and tell the voters what they intent to do in Brussels the next 4 years. After the Dutch NO the government launched a programme to improve the communication of Europe. But they misunderstood the message of the no-vote; it is not communication the people want it is transparency and democracy. People want to have a say in the decisions. It looks like there will be a new constitution or perhaps something called the Treaty of Berlin. But the way things are going now, this constitution will not be made with any input of the Dutch. At one point the message of the EU to the Dutch government will be to take it or leave it. And in the end the Dutch government might even decide to take it without consulting the citizens. My case was that the election results are bad news for Europe. The winners do not like Europe, the losers are busy with their own problems and the elite have no vision. I do hope my analysis is wrong and the Dutch stop paying only lip service to the most important political project of our time. I hope they start playing an important role again in this project which is the only key to peace and prosperity, not only in this part of the world but in the world at large. The situation makes it even more obvious that there is a 'political deficit' in Holland as well regarding European politics. This election is showing that without Newropeans, there is almost no chance to have any debate on European issues at next European elections in June 2009. Veronique Swinkels*
Amsterdam (The Netherlands)
Communication consultant and member of the board of Newropeans
*Véronique Swinkels (Maastricht, 1963), 2 daughters and 2 sons. Studied Communications Policy at the university of Amsterdam and at the City University of London. Her political carrier started as candidate for the IDE-list for Holland during the 1989 European elections. Communications and Advertising for non-profit organisations, government and culture is her line of business. First as research manager and account manager at several BBDO agencies. Today as managing partner of her own adverting agency BBK/ Door Vriendschap Sterker.
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La deuxième rencontre du cycle
“LA DEMOCRATIE EN DANGER”,
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Le lundi 13 septembre
de 19h30 à 22h00
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Intervenants: les députés européens Luigi De Magistris, Sonia Alfano et Rosario Crocetta ; Harald Greib, vice-président de Newropeans en charge des affaires des institutions européennes ; Eric Alt, magistrat, membre de l’association MEDEL (magistrats européens pour la démocratie et les libertés) et de l’association Anticor, et Corinne Lepage, députée européenne et ex Ministre de l’environnement, engagée dans la lutte contre la corruption politique et financière.
Parmi les sujets de discussion:
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