LANDS bs_bs_banner AND THE RISE OF MAINSTREAM NATIONALISM AND XENOPHOBIA IN DUTCH POLITICS Dirk Witteveen Although right-wing nationalist Geert Wilders party leader of the Party for Freedom in the Netherlands did not receive the most votes in the 2017 parliamentary elections, it is questionable whether this result really marks a retreat of nationalist and xenophobic politics. In the months leading up the elections in March of 2017, polls had indicated a potential victory of Wilders party with a margin as big as 8 percent to its nearest rivals in January of the same year. As argued in this essay, the turnaround in the 2 months preceding the elections, in favor of the Liberal Conservatives and the Christian Democrats, has been falsely considered a push-back from the political center. Instead, the traditional centrist parties have slowly adopted Wilders position on Islam, Muslim-Dutchmen, immigration, refugees, and the EU. This essay makes the case for mainstreaming of the far-right ideology. Introduction International media across Europe and North America spoke words of relief after the national elections in the Netherlands on March 15, 2017. The infamous Party for Freedom (PVV), run by Geert Wilders, received 13 percent of the votes, equal to 20 seats in the 150-seat parliament. For the anti-islam party, it meant a relatively small expansion of their previous 10 percent share (15 seats) of the 2012 2017 parliament. Since the beginning of 2016, Wilders PVV had led in the polls, with some projecting they would win 42 seats. The Liberal Conservatives (VVD), led by Prime Minister Mark Rutte, lost almost a quarter of their seats (from 41 to 33 seats) but nonetheless remain the largest party. This enables Rutte to continue to govern in a newly formed coalition with the Christian Democrats (CDA) and the Liberal Democrats (D66). With VVD remaining the biggest party not Wilders PVV many political journalists reported that the Dutch electorate had rejected or at least stopped right-wing, xenophobic populism. But this might well be the wrong conclusion. Result 33/150 Liberal Conservatives (VVD) 20/150 Right-wing Nationalists (PVV/Wilders) Journal of Labor and Society 2471-4607 Volume 20 September 2017 pp. 373 378 VC 2017 Immanuel Ness and Wiley Periodicals, Inc.
374 JOURNAL OF LABOR AND SOCIETY 19/150 Christian Democrats (CDA) 19/150 Liberal Democrats (D66) 14/150 Greens (GroenLinks) 14/150 Socialists (SP) 14/150 Labor (PvdA) 5/150 Social Christians (ChristenUnie) 5/150 Animal Party (PvdD) 4/150 Elderly Party (50Plus) 3/150 Turkish Party/Labor split (DENK) 3/150 Orthodox Protestants (SGP) 2/150 Conservative Nationalists (FvD) Islamophobia Back in 2004, Geert Wilders left the Liberal Conservative party (VVD) over the Dutch (and EU s) strengthening ties with Turkey. He started his own political movement, with the primary focus on stopping the Islamization of the Netherlands. While his economic agenda slowly crossed over to the left side of the political spectrum, in particular with regard to healthcare and social security, a rapid radicalization took place in his cultural and social program over the course of a decade. Wilders produced a short political film Fitna (2008) which links verses of the Qur an to terrorism, violence against women, infidels, and homosexuals. The film led to strong criticism throughout the political elite, as well as a condemnation by the Muslim community and civil society more generally. It was only the start of a political hate campaign toward the Muslim world, the Dutch-Turks, and the Dutch-Moroccans. Fast forward to the current elections, Wilders political program was released on a single sheet calling for the closure all Muslim schools and mosques, and calling for the Qur an to be banned. He also called for a referendum to leave the EU, with the primary goal of closing the borders to Muslims. Additionally, Wilders has avoided most of the election debates for various reasons, such as disagreeing with the number of invited politicians, arguing that journalists treated him unfairly, or simply because he doesn t like the broadcaster. During the campaign period, he frequently sent out angry tweets from his couch, including tweets calling the parliament a fake parliament (2015). Wilders was convicted for hate speech in 2016 for instigating chants of fewer Moroccans! among rally audiences. During the trial and after the ruling, he sent out tweets about PVVhating judges, fake judges, and fake courts. In February, Wilders posted a photo of Liberal Democratic leader Alexander Pechtold photo-shopped into a
WITTEVEEN: XENOPHOBIA IN DUTCH POLITICS 375 (pro-) Hamas demonstration holding a Shariah for the Netherlands sign. Sounds familiar? Is Geert Wilders the Donald Trump of the Netherlands? Could the Dutch political landscape of today be a forerunner of America s future political climate? And at the European podium, could Wilders anti-eu and nationalist approach force a Nexit -referendum to leave the European Union, comparable to UKIP s Nigel Farage? Directly following the election results, politicians, and media across the spectrum, both domestically and internationally, embraced the story that the Dutch voted pro-eu and anti-xenophobia. But let us first look at the winners before drawing this conclusion. Why should we not get our hopes up and stop celebrating the defeat of xenophobic populism? Despite some similarities to Trump, and also Farage, Wilders lackluster election does not portend the defeat of right-wing populism. Islam, Identity, and the EU The Liberal Conservatives (VVD), winners of the election, and the CDA, the third-largest party, both defend a highly protectionist and nationalist agenda. Both parties are against EU expansion. These center-right parties have traditionally been in favor of European integration, and they continue to stress international cooperation through the union and treaties (NATO). But their domestic politics build on the idea that the Netherlands should take power over immigration policy back from the EU and make it much stricter. Their pro-eu voice is misleading and deceptive, to say the least, as for them European cooperation means demanding that Southern and Eastern European countries stop the flow of Middle Eastern and African immigrants and war refugees. Mark Rutte (VVD) has proposed a highly protectionist international political agenda, arguing that if the Netherlands accepts Middle Eastern refugees now, it will only boost the immigration wave for which the country is not prepared. To be sure, the Netherlands accepted a slightly below-average number of refugees (0.87 per 1,000 citizens) compared to other European countries (Eurostat 2017), also substantially fewer than the 1990s-flow from former Yugoslavia. Meanwhile, both VVD and CDA, as well as the resigning coalition member Labor (PvdA), are strong proponents of preemptively detecting and eliminating likely terrorists in Syria before they radicalize and place bombs in the Amsterdam subway (PvdA vice-prime-minister Lodewijk Asscher in a television debate). Mirroring Donald Trump, the leaders of these three traditional parties warn of terrorist attacks such as in Brussels, Paris, and Copenhagen, even though there has not been any such terrorist attack in the Netherlands. Ever. Their statements are part of a growing nationalist and military voice from the traditional right to the center-left of the political spectrum. All parties also agree on a significant expansion of the military budget for more naval ships and F-35 fighters under the guise of keeping the country safe. Most importantly, many political parties, primarily the Liberal Conservatives (VVD) and Christian Democrats (CDA) ran a campaign based on fear of
376 JOURNAL OF LABOR AND SOCIETY losing Dutch identity and Western cultural values. They insist on a continuing threat from radical Islam, even among Dutch-born Muslims. By the latter, they do not refer to the renowned Dutch values of tolerance and freedom of religion. Instead, in their key statements they envision a 1950slike world that concentrate on the native Dutch, with oftentimes offensive, racist, and belittling messages to the public. VVD s Mark Rutte openly calls prominent Dutch-Moroccan vloggers scum and the Islamic call to prayer ugly. Subsequently, VVD s campaign slogan was Act Normally! which implies a subtle conform to Dutch values, such as accepting same-sex marriage and women s rights. This campaign slogan was further supported by an open letter by party leader Mark Rutte, in which he states Those people who refuse to adapt, and criticize our values should act normally or leave. [...] If you so fundamentally reject this country then I d prefer you to leave (VVD 2017). In the same letter, Rutte mentions examples of such rejections, including labeling ordinary Dutch people as racists, revealing what he means by the normal ones. It marks a U-turn in the Liberal Conservatives tradition as their campaign clearly separates out toward which ideas they are willing to be tolerant or liberal. On the Christian Democratic side, party leader Sybrand Buma rolled out a proposal to require the national anthem to be sung in every school. He also vocally questions the loyalty of second-generation Dutch Turks with dual passports, saying that their interest in the upcoming Turkish referendum on President Erdogan s power proves their failed assimilation into Dutch society. Moreover, Buma took a chance to invigorate his nationalism on international women s day by claiming that women have been equal to men for centuries in our Judeo-Christian society, implying that new immigrants and refugees, and even Dutch-Muslims, would threaten gender equality. But where is the Left? Labor (PvdA) lost 29 of their 38 seats in the parliament and are unlikely to have an impact on the government s policy in the years to come. Their record on equal rights is not much better. The Labor Party chair argued that Dutch Moroccans who are not okay should be humiliated by the state. The (Muslim) labor mayor of Rotterdam told those Dutch Muslims who sympathize with ISIS to f*** off, while their party leader stated that Dutch Moroccans have an ethnic monopoly on crime. This is the politics of fear going mainstream. The traditional blocks Liberal Conservatives, Christian Democrats, and Labor have adopted a highly protectionist and nationalistic political rhetoric. The political philosophy behind this is new within their respective party frameworks, but it has nonetheless been made very explicit over the last several years by the proposed antiimmigration and anti-refugee policies, as well as a military action that smells like war crimes that is, military action with no internationally ratified mandate. The argumentation regarding the threat of radical Islam and the potential threat from radicalizing Dutch-Muslims is a profound (mainstream) mechanism of othering ; there are Dutch values like not pointing out racism and just knowing the national anthem and those values that apparently clash with the Dutch
WITTEVEEN: XENOPHOBIA IN DUTCH POLITICS 377 identity. If asked who they mean by the nonconformist, the VVD and CDA language yields staggering and explicitly racist tones, scaring citizens of their Muslim-neighbors and war refugees. The Disenfranchised Wilders Voter Geert Wilders is unlikely to ever govern in the coalition-based Dutch political system. Virtually all political parties have consistently stated that they will never join a coalition cabinet of which Wilders PVV is part of. This means that his PVV-voters remain disenfranchised in the political sphere. Regardless of the VVD and CDA victories, the party consistently wins between 10 and 20 percent of the vote. Even though the political spectrum has moved to the far-right over the last decade, this does not mean that the far-right share of the electorate is satisfied. In contrast, the long-time Wilders voters still lack representation and still seek a less elitist and more radical leadership. So, they remain frustrated. Similar to Trump, his electorate is disproportionally white, lower-educated, lower-class, and rural (or noncoastal). They have seen a rapid erosion of the welfare state throughout the 1990s and 2000s, which also explains some of Wilders standpoints on, for instance, retirement age (back to 65) and significant investments in homes for the elderly. He is by far the loudest antielite voice in Dutch politics, which is presumably the main reason for his political success over the past decade. However, Wilders remains unable to answer either the anti- Islamization concerns or the pro-welfare-state interests of his voters through participation in a coalition cabinet. Although Dutch Moroccans are disproportionally represented in the petty crime statistics, many of Wilders voters reside in the rural areas of the country, with the lowest rate of first- or second-generation immigrants. As mentioned before, there has been no terrorist attack in the Netherlands not even a reported thwarted one. The picture that unfolds is one quite comparable to the U.S., where the white working-class feels left behind in the nonurban states. Moreover, the refugee centers that have recently been opened in rural parts of the country ignited local protests from PVV-sympathizers, as well as from other citizens. In addition to Islamophobic slurs expressed on many of these occasions, the crowds consistently refer to (perceived) privileges that immigrants and refugees receive food, education, housing, employment services that they themselves lack or face long waitlists for. Notwithstanding the simmering and explicit racism within the Dutch population, any fair assessment of the current rise of xenophobia must include the real economic standing and (perceived) relative economic fall of the working- and lower-middle class. The newly formed right-wing coalition is likely to be supplemented with the Liberal Democrats, and potentially the Green Party or the Social Christians all more cohesive and slightly less anti-immigrant but the direction of the Dutch government is clearly rightwards. The Labor and Socialist parties lost ground and have not been able to revive social democracy as explicitly as Bernie Sanders. Green Party leader Jesse Klaver, who scored lower than expected by
378 JOURNAL OF LABOR AND SOCIETY the polls (9 percent), insists on reducing the gap between poor and rich but he lacks a class-based electorate and remains relatively silent on welfare state programs. While Donald Trump s rise is still recent, Geert Wilders has been building his far-right agenda for more than a decade. Of crucial importance is in which direction the U.S. political center will move in the years to come. But if Wilders is the fast-forward version of Trump, Europe s forerunner of nationalism and xenophobia, then Dutch Liberal Conservatives and Christian Democrats did not save the world from a madman. In fact, these elections could well be Wilders greatest victory, as it must be any politician s dream of their ideology becoming mainstream. Traditional parties have adopted barely softened versions of Wilders policies effectively through rather populist campaigns by VVD and CDA. And thus the narrative of the media is wrong; the entire Dutch political spectrum has been pushed to the right and right-wing populism has become the mainstream. More pessimistically, as long as the left remains unable to appeal to the working class grievances, the Netherlands will continue to breed its social conservatism. Dirk Witteveen is a PhD Candidate in the Department of Sociology at the City University of New York, the Graduate Center. REFERENCES Eurostat. 2017. Asylum quarterly report. http://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/statistics-explained/index.php/asylum_ quarterly_report (accessed April 28, 2017). VVD. 2017. Brief van mark. http://www.vvd.nl/nieuws/lees-hier-de-brief-van-mark/ (accessed April 28, 2017).