Tag: Politics

Cabinet Wilders I: An Inward Looking Netherlands?

By Rita Zeefal

Something is brewing in the Hague. The 17th of September marked the beginning of the Dutch parliamentary calendar and, for the first time since the Second World War, a hard-right government assumed the seat of the executive. Geert Wilders, a long-time vindicator of the European populist right, is in prime position to shape the next few years of Dutch interior and foreign policy. Wilders’ Party for Freedom (PVV) controls the key ministries needed to advance its agenda of “putting the Dutch first again” and intends, among other things, to opt out of European Union (EU) asylum treaties and make it harder for non-citizens in the Netherlands to acquire housing, citizenship, and welfare assistance, among other things. 

Wilders’ government, headed by the unaffiliated former civil servant Dick Schoof, is already in the process of passing an Emergency Asylum Act that will allow the government to pass asylum laws without the approval of parliament. While some of these moves might just be pure politicking, there is real unease about what the incoming Dutch government might mean for business, relations with Brussels, and rule of law in the country.

The far right in the Netherlands has never been as successful as it has over the past fifteen years. Much of this can be attributed to Geert Wilders’ political credibility: unlike the leaders of previous far right and fascist parties in the Netherlands (like Hans Janmaat of the now defunct Dutch Centre Party), Wilders has been a career politician for the greater part of thirty years. A self-described “right-wing liberal,” Wilders cut his teeth in the centre-right People’s Party for Freedom and Democracy (VVD), and was at one point tipped to become its leader before losing out to Mark Rutte in the mid 2000s. Unlike right-wing populists in Poland or Italy, Wilders is sufficiently supportive of LGBTQ+ and reproductive rights, which he sees as being at the heart of Dutch tolerance culture. Unlike Marine Le Pen’s Rassemblement National or Austria’s Freedom Party, Wilders and his party have no Nazi history to shirk or political credibility to prove – they simply had to wait for the right moment to be embraced by a disaffected electorate. And such a moment came in the form of the November 2023 general election in the Netherlands, which was preceded by the VVD’s Dilan Yesilgöz’s removing a longstanding cordon sanitaire that had been levelled against the PVV for the greater part of the 2010s. Yesilgöz stated plainly before the election that her party would be open to forming a government with Wilders’ PVV. 

The PVV seems to be a party that seeks to turn the Netherlands in on itself. Its 2023  election manifesto blames the country’s longstanding housing crisis on asylum seekers, who constitute the vast minority of people who migrate to the Netherlands annually. Unlike the far right in countries like France and Italy who tend to clean up their image and mollify their message the closer they get to power, the PVV has stood firmly behind some of its most hard-line policies in recent times. The party’s prior-mentioned election manifesto advocated for the development of “denaturalisation” processes so as to make possible the deportation of recently naturalised citizens deemed “undesirable.” The new government seeks to make Dutch the primary language of higher education in the Netherlands to ward off international students. The repercussions of such political positions and the policies that they would help create over the next few years could resound sharply in the worlds of commerce, academia, and labour for years to come.

Indeed, policies that are set to hinder international flows of human capital are already ruffling the feathers of those at the helm of the Netherlands’ most valuable companies. In March of this year, the outgoing Minister of Economic Affairs Micky Adriaansens met with former CEO of ASML Peter Wennink to address the company’s plans to move its operations out of the Netherlands should migratory regulations in the country become too strict. ASML is Europe’s most valuable tech company, and it currently has a workforce of over 40 000 employees comprising over 143 nationalities. Being home to cutting edge firms and having a vibrant economy are realities that every country aims to maintain; however, the rise of the populist right in the Netherlands has put the country’s government between a rock and a hard place. De-internationalising the Netherlands and making it harder for workers from the rest of the world to gain access to living requirements could pose a dire threat to the friendly business environment the country has prided itself on for so long.

A brief look at history shows that the Netherlands’ openness to the outside world has been a cornerstone of its success for centuries. According to scholars like the University of Amsterdam’s Geert Janssen, the United Provinces, which later became the Dutch Republic, became a magnet for the religiously persecuted of Europe in the wake of the Reformation and the Spanish Inquisition. Sephardic and Ashkenazi Jews, Flemish Protestants, English Puritans, and French Huguenots migrated in the hundreds of thousands, to such an extent that over the course of the 17th century, 40 to 60 percent of the population of major Dutch cities like Amsterdam and Leiden was made up of foreign-born inhabitants. In more recent times, the Netherlands has been at the forefront of European integration and still engages with the world beyond its metropolitan shores. It was a founding member of the European Coal and Steel Community and is bound by international law. It still administers overseas territories. The Netherlands has, for the greater part of its history, never been a country to shut itself off from the world. 

The populist right in the country positions itself as the chief protector of core Dutch values and traditions like social liberalism and Zwarte Piet (a Dutch Christmas blackface tradition), from the supposed evils of Islam and woke-brainwashing. But are not the rule of law, international collaboration, compromise, and pragmatism just as, if not more, central to the country’s identity and success over the centuries?

The new Dutch government’s ability to execute its mandate remains to be proved. For now, politicking seems to be at the top of the ministerial agenda. On the 18th of September, Marjolein Faber, the Netherlands’ Minister for Asylum and Migration, informed the European Commission of her government’s wish to opt out of the EU’s new Migration and Asylum pact, to which the Netherlands is already a signatory. What might not be readily apparent to the casual reader of this story is that this was a move with almost no chance of initiating real change in the Netherlands’ relationship with Brussels. The clumsily written letter itself acknowledges that an opt out for the Netherlands would only be possible in the event of treaty amendment, and amendment of EU treaties after they have been approved and have come into effect happens exceedingly rarely, if at all. Furthermore, Faber ought to have sent the letter to the Council of the European UnionEuropean Council – not the European Commission. This proves to be the first in a series of gaffes that seem  on course to typify the far-right’s first stab at governing the Netherlands.

On the whole, the rise of the populist right in the Netherlands serves as another theatre of shallow politicking addressed to a weary electorate. But if the country wants to retain its status as a magnet for talent, a hub of innovation, and a place where business thrives, it might have to come up with solutions that go beyond what Wilders and his ministers are putting on the table. 

Why Charlie Chaplin’s 1940 Anti-Fascist Film May Be More Relevant Than Ever

By Tyler Jaewon Kim

Chaplin in The Great Dictator. Photo credit: Public Domain.

In partnership with Le Havrealisation.

The modern film landscape is, sometimes unfairly, oft-maligned as being increasingly political. Simply put, a common criticism of movies today is that they are “too woke.” Be it the two largest Hollywood blockbuster films of last summer – “Barbie” and “Oppenheimer” – or other contemporary international films such as “Parasite” (2020), many critically acclaimed films of the last decade have had this low-hanging criticism levied against them.

But this is simply not true. Art is inherently political, and film is an artistic medium. Films have, from the very beginning, been used as the conduit through which directors can convey their personal political messages. Nowhere can this be seen more than in Charlie Chaplin’s 1940 film “The Great Dictator.”

Chaplin’s first full talkie (sound film) tells the story of two men at opposite ends of the fictional European nation of Tomainia: its fascist dictator Adenoid Hynkel (a less-than subtle stand-in for Adolf Hitler) and a lowly unnamed Jewish barber readapting to life after World War I in the ghetto. The catch? Both men are played by Chaplin and thus look exactly the same.

Chaplin’s combination of wry humor with social commentary extends beyond the simple premise of the movie. Chaplin, whose name is synonymous with the golden age of silent-era comedies, frequently lampoons the follies of totalitarianism with his signature slapstick comedy.

Hynkel’s runtime is filled with farcical acts such as having an extended “ballet” sequence with an inflated globe or by getting in a food fight with Benzino Napaloni of Bacteria (a parody of Benito Mussolini). On the other hand, the Jewish barber’s continuous optimism and perseverance in the face of extreme adversity serves as the crux of the film’s emotional center. His friendships and relationships develop (albeit sometimes a bit too slowly) over the two hour runtime and culminate in one of the most rousing monologues in film history. 

It is important, however, to remember the context in which this film was made. Writing began shortly after Hitler had recently received the Time Person of the Year award, prior to the German invasion of Poland and before the full extent of Nazi Germany’s crimes throughout the Holocaust was generally known (Chaplin himself later stated that the film would not have been made had he known). 

Ultimately, “The Great Dictator” has aged surprisingly well in an era where its fundamentally anti-fascist message is, unfortunately, much-needed. Though it may poke fun at one of the darkest moments of human history, Chaplin’s appeal for humanity shines through and enshrines the final product as a testament to the power of film as both an artistic and political tool.

G2+1= pizza!

HD organizes conference with Dean Stéphanie Balme to discuss the role of Europe in Taiwan Strait Sovereignty issue

“In Le Havre, I feel like home”. With this kind remark, Stéphanie Balme began her speech to an Amphi crowded with students who listened attentively, a slice of pizza in their hands, as though “they were in a movie”, as the speaker said.

Continue reading “G2+1= pizza!”