Social Europe

politics, economy and employment & labour

  • Themes
    • Strategic autonomy
    • War in Ukraine
    • European digital sphere
    • Recovery and resilience
  • Publications
    • Books
    • Dossiers
    • Occasional Papers
    • Research Essays
    • Brexit Paper Series
  • Podcast
  • Videos
  • Newsletter

The Dutch Referendum – Revolt Of The 60%

Rene Cuperus 18th April 2016

René Cuperus

René Cuperus

Highly educated versus lowly educated. Muslims against non-Muslims. ’People’ versus ‘Elite’. Young against old. Mainstream against populist. All is pointing in the same direction: countries like the Netherlands enter the future in increasingly separate worlds. The divisive tensions seem to triumph over the binding, bridging forces.

Take the Dutch referendum about the EU-Association Agreement with Ukraine on April 6. That referendum was initiated, under a new law, through a massive signature campaign by eurosceptic, even anti-EU, organisations in the Netherlands, under the umbrella of ‘GeenPeil’: an anti-Establishment collective.

However, the breaking news of the referendum had little or nothing to do with Ukraine itself, or with the Ukrainian population. Let alone with the sacrifice of the Heavenly Hundred at the Maidan revolution. No, the alarming news about the referendum outcome was that it was a complete reconfirmation of the populist cleavage or conflict line running through (nearly) all contemporary western societies. The referendum demonstrated the clash between the Establishment and the non-Establishment; the tormented Ukrainian people played – bitter to say – little more than the role of a walk-on.

The outcome was as follows: 61% voted against the association agreement; 38% voted in favour (based on a low turnout of 32.2% or just above the 30% threshold). This result was a repetition of the outcome of the Dutch referendum on the European Constitution of 2005, when the Dutch also in clear majority voted ‘’nee’’, after the French voted ‘’non’’.

Big-time losers

Now again, the whole established order of the Netherlands lost big time. All the main parties, the traditional media, trade unions, employers organisations, churches, etc. constituted the Yes camp, supporting the EU-relationship with Ukraine. Despite all this, the No camp, led by an alliance of the Geert Wilders Party (right-wing populist), the Socialist Party (left-wing populist), and a strong social media campaign organisation, demonstratively won the referendum battle.


Our job is keeping you informed!


Subscribe to our free newsletter and stay up to date with the latest Social Europe content. We will never send you spam and you can unsubscribe anytime.

Sign up here

Another painful disgrace for the Dutch Establishment, unable to prevent an international loss of face for the Netherlands. The referendum outcome is also a great shame, maybe not so much for the corrupt political oligarch system of Ukraine, but more so for the western-oriented young Maidan activist generation. The result also adds to the already perfect storm within the EU (euro crisis, refugee crisis, tensions between North and South, East and West) as well as fuelling tensions between the EU and Putin’s revanchist Russia. And there could be more to come with the UK‘s own EU referendum on June 23; as Mark Rutte, Dutch premier, whispered: “Brussels does not want to speak openly about the Dutch #Ukrainereferendum outcome before #Brexit referendum takes place.”

But again: the referendum debate was first and foremost an anti-Establishment revolt. This revolt includes enlargement fatigue and EU discontent, but the story is much bigger. The result of 60% versus 40% (both in 2005 and 2016) should be taken seriously. This distribution in numbers is returning over and over again. Especially in reports of the Institute for Social Research of the Dutch government (SCP). This institute regularly analyses the temper and mood of the Dutch population, and this has been intensified by way of qualitative focus group research after the so-called Revolt of Citizens of Pim Fortuyn in 2001/2002. This ‘’unpredicted’’ revolution demonstrated that both academia and media had completely lost touch with the undercurrents of discontent – especially in lower and middle strata in society.

The great divide

The fact that this 60/40-distributive code or formula time and again resurfaces in research and referenda suggest that we are confronted with the following fundamental phenomenon: a distinct majority of the population may well resist the course, the future direction, of our contemporary society. 60% distrusts the EU, resists the overall erosion of the post-war welfare state, criticises increasing inequality, has big worries about labour migration and refugee migration in general, and Islam in particular. They fear that their country because of immigration and open borders is losing too many of its characteristic traits.

This large group of citizens at the same time has the feeling that ‘people like us’ can do little or nothing about these changes and developments. Politics and politicians just go their own way. That’s why this (significant) majority of 60% is in favour of referenda, to wake up, correct or punish the political class. They have the feeling that it no longer represents them or listens to them.

What is even more unpleasant is that this 60% more or less equals the amount of lowly and averagely (non-HE) educated people in the Netherlands. These segments feel much less comfortable in the globalising knowledge-based economy, where the world has become a ‘global village’, but at the same the traditional village has become the world. They profit less from this new global order.

This deep cleavage in our post-welfare state societies is not socially sustainable. No country can welcome and embrace the future with such a bizarre rift between future-optimistic academic professionals and future-pessimistic non-academic professionals. Between insiders and outsiders in the new ‘meritocratic democracy’. Let alone the growing tensions between Muslims and non-Muslims as a result of jihadist radicalisation and terrorism.

All signals point to polarisation and sharpening of dividing lines. Worrisome is that this diverging of opinions – also in the Dutch referendum campaign – is coupled with more and more poisonous smears and slurs on social media and with mutual contempt between Establishment and anti-Establishment.

What such a divided country as the Netherlands now needs most is a break-up of stereotypes and group identities. Concepts such as ‘people’, ‘elite’, Establishment, populism and Islam must be refuted and invalidated as false entities. Pluralism and pluriformity must shake up solidified contradistinctions. Devastating is the image of politics as an old boys’ network for academic professionals only. The ‘elite’ should leave its post-political bubble, and again fight against each other for a left-wing and right-wing alternative political future. Muslims who wholeheartedly and deliberately opt for the Western way of life should distance themselves sharply from radical Islam, as right-wing populists should demarcate themselves sharply from the far and extreme right.


We need your support


Social Europe is an independent publisher and we believe in freely available content. For this model to be sustainable, however, we depend on the solidarity of our readers. Become a Social Europe member for less than 5 Euro per month and help us produce more articles, podcasts and videos. Thank you very much for your support!

Become a Social Europe Member

This will result in more varieties of the elite, more flavours of Islam, more sorts of populists, and thereby a visible break-up and deconstruction of stereotypes and identity-political group stigmas. How else should we fight to avert segregated, divisive, unequal societies in future?

Rene Cuperus

René Cuperus is Director for International Relations and Senior Research Fellow at the Wiardi Beckman Foundation, think tank of the Dutch Labour Party/PvdA. He is also columnist at Dutch daily de Volkskrant.

You are here: Home / Politics / The Dutch Referendum – Revolt Of The 60%

Most Popular Posts

Visentini,ITUC,Qatar,Fight Impunity,50,000 Visentini, ‘Fight Impunity’, the ITUC and QatarFrank Hoffer
Russian soldiers' mothers,war,Ukraine The Ukraine war and Russian soldiers’ mothersJennifer Mathers and Natasha Danilova
IGU,documents,International Gas Union,lobby,lobbying,sustainable finance taxonomy,green gas,EU,COP ‘Gaslighting’ Europe on fossil fuelsFaye Holder
Schengen,Fortress Europe,Romania,Bulgaria Romania and Bulgaria stuck in EU’s second tierMagdalena Ulceluse
income inequality,inequality,Gini,1 per cent,elephant chart,elephant Global income inequality: time to revise the elephantBranko Milanovic

Most Recent Posts

Pakistan,flooding,floods Flooded Pakistan, symbol of climate injusticeZareen Zahid Qureshi
reality check,EU foreign policy,Russia Russia’s invasion of Ukraine: a reality check for the EUHeidi Mauer, Richard Whitman and Nicholas Wright
permanent EU investment fund,Recovery and Resilience Facility,public investment,RRF Towards a permanent EU investment fundPhilipp Heimberger and Andreas Lichtenberger
sustainability,SDGs,Finland Embedding sustainability in a government programmeJohanna Juselius
social dialogue,social partners Social dialogue must be at the heart of Europe’s futureClaes-Mikael Ståhl

Other Social Europe Publications

front cover scaled Towards a social-democratic century?
Cover e1655225066994 National recovery and resilience plans
Untitled design The transatlantic relationship
Women Corona e1631700896969 500 Women and the coronavirus crisis
sere12 1 RE No. 12: Why No Economic Democracy in Sweden?

Eurofound advertisement

Eurofound webinar: Making telework work for everyone

Since 2020 more European workers and managers have enjoyed greater flexibility and autonomy in work and are reporting their preference for hybrid working. Also driven by technological developments and structural changes in employment, organisations are now integrating telework more permanently into their workplace.

To reflect on these shifts, on 6 December Eurofound researchers Oscar Vargas and John Hurley explored the challenges and opportunities of the surge in telework, as well as the overall growth of telework and teleworkable jobs in the EU and what this means for workers, managers, companies and policymakers.


WATCH THE WEBINAR HERE

Foundation for European Progressive Studies Advertisement

The winter issue of the Progressive Post magazine from FEPS is out!

The sequence of recent catastrophes has thrust new words into our vocabulary—'polycrisis', for example, even 'permacrisis'. These challenges have multiple origins, reinforce each other and cannot be tackled individually. But could they also be opportunities for the EU?

This issue offers compelling analyses on the European health union, multilateralism and international co-operation, the state of the union, political alternatives to the narrative imposed by the right and much more!


DOWNLOAD HERE

Hans Böckler Stiftung Advertisement

The macroeconomic effects of re-applying the EU fiscal rules

Against the background of the European Commission's reform plans for the Stability and Growth Pact (SGP), this policy brief uses the macroeconometric multi-country model NiGEM to simulate the macroeconomic implications of the most relevant reform options from 2024 onwards. Next to a return to the existing and unreformed rules, the most prominent options include an expenditure rule linked to a debt anchor.

Our results for the euro area and its four biggest economies—France, Italy, Germany and Spain—indicate that returning to the rules of the SGP would lead to severe cuts in public spending, particularly if the SGP rules were interpreted as in the past. A more flexible interpretation would only somewhat ease the fiscal-adjustment burden. An expenditure rule along the lines of the European Fiscal Board would, however, not necessarily alleviate that burden in and of itself.

Our simulations show great care must be taken to specify the expenditure rule, such that fiscal consolidation is achieved in a growth-friendly way. Raising the debt ceiling to 90 per cent of gross domestic product and applying less demanding fiscal adjustments, as proposed by the IMK, would go a long way.


DOWNLOAD HERE

ILO advertisement

Global Wage Report 2022-23: The impact of inflation and COVID-19 on wages and purchasing power

The International Labour Organization's Global Wage Report is a key reference on wages and wage inequality for the academic community and policy-makers around the world.

This eighth edition of the report, The Impact of inflation and COVID-19 on wages and purchasing power, examines the evolution of real wages, giving a unique picture of wage trends globally and by region. The report includes evidence on how wages have evolved through the COVID-19 crisis as well as how the current inflationary context is biting into real wage growth in most regions of the world. The report shows that for the first time in the 21st century real wage growth has fallen to negative values while, at the same time, the gap between real productivity growth and real wage growth continues to widen.

The report analysis the evolution of the real total wage bill from 2019 to 2022 to show how its different components—employment, nominal wages and inflation—have changed during the COVID-19 crisis and, more recently, during the cost-of-living crisis. The decomposition of the total wage bill, and its evolution, is shown for all wage employees and distinguishes between women and men. The report also looks at changes in wage inequality and the gender pay gap to reveal how COVID-19 may have contributed to increasing income inequality in different regions of the world. Together, the empirical evidence in the report becomes the backbone of a policy discussion that could play a key role in a human-centred recovery from the different ongoing crises.


DOWNLOAD HERE

ETUI advertisement

The EU recovery strategy: a blueprint for a more Social Europe or a house of cards?

This new ETUI paper explores the European Union recovery strategy, with a focus on its potentially transformative aspects vis-à-vis European integration and its implications for the social dimension of the EU’s socio-economic governance. In particular, it reflects on whether the agreed measures provide sufficient safeguards against the spectre of austerity and whether these constitute steps away from treating social and labour policies as mere ‘variables’ of economic growth.


DOWNLOAD HERE

About Social Europe

Our Mission

Article Submission

Membership

Advertisements

Legal Disclosure

Privacy Policy

Copyright

Social Europe ISSN 2628-7641

Social Europe Archives

Search Social Europe

Themes Archive

Politics Archive

Economy Archive

Society Archive

Ecology Archive

Follow us

RSS Feed

Follow us on Facebook

Follow us on Twitter

Follow us on LinkedIn

Follow us on YouTube