Dutch politics is all at sea – it’s time for leaders to chart a new course
Dutch politicians could learn something from the world’s largest maritime festival. Last weekend 10,000 vessels, including many replicas of old merchant ships, sailed through Amsterdam to mark the city’s 750th anniversary. It was a spectacle. Every vessel had a captain and a course. But simultaneously, in The Hague, the nation’s politics was cast adrift as its leaders abandoned ship.
The trigger was the shock departure of the centre-right New Social Contract (NSC) party from the ruling coalition over disagreements regarding sanctions on Israel. Ministers resigned en bloc, leaving only two of the four coalition parties remaining. Never in modern Dutch history has an entire party resigned from a caretaker cabinet. Nine ministerial posts were hastily redistributed among the survivors but reshuffling is no substitute for leadership. With the sombre tone of a captain going down with his ship, prime minister Dick Schoof – a technocrat with little political capital – could only note, “We must respect these decisions but we deeply regret them.”
The timing could hardly be worse. In a few days the government must submit its draft budget to the Council of State, a constitutional requirement that admits no delay. With just 32 parliamentary seats between them, the remaining People’s Party for Freedom and Democracy (VVD) and the Farmer-Citizen Movement (BBB) now govern with the authority of a parish council. Critical fissures exist between them over issues ranging from immigration and housing shortages to the crisis in Gaza.
The ripple effect from the coalition’s exodus extends well beyond The Hague. Neighbours in Brussels, where reliability is currency, increasingly see the Dutch as the bloc’s court jester – often entertaining, occasionally useful but hardly serious. The country, once valued for pragmatic mediation between larger European powers, now risks marginalisation. But Schoof’s second cabinet collapse in three months is symptomatic of a wider European malaise. Traditional parties fracture along identity lines, populists provide simplistic solutions and professionals appear unable to govern effectively. Perhaps it is time for a more radical experiment. Citizen assemblies in European cities have demonstrated their ability to produce more coherent policies than parliaments. Estonia’s e-governance model functions with enviable efficiency. Switzerland thrives with a system that limits the power of career politicians.
The Dutch take pride in pragmatic innovation. The political class, however, has proven catastrophically inadequate. Perhaps the moment has come to bypass the middlemen of politics and explore whether citizens themselves can set a clearer course. At the very least, voters deserve more than another season of governmental drift.
In Amsterdam, millions watched tall ships slice across the IJ, their crews working in unison with clarity of purpose. The spectacle was more than nostalgia: it was an example of modern-day discipline and collective direction. If the country’s leaders could recover even a fraction of that spirit, the Netherlands might still find a way through the populist storm.
Stefan de Vries is an Amsterdam-based journalist and regular Monocle contributor. For more opinion, analysis and insight, subscribe to Monocle today.
