Rediscovering Europe in the Netherlands - St Antony's College ...

civil society
that are relevant to their causes. However, the asymmetry between the
activities of (especially traditional) civil society organisations in the
Netherlands and the domains in which eu policy is relevant begs the question
of whether the diversity of civil society and thus its representativeness
is sufficiently guaranteed. If the government wishes to assure the input of
civil society in the formulation of national eu policy, it is vital that attention
not be limited to the traditional, institutionalised organisations. Given
this asymmetry, it is important that attention be paid to ad hoc initiatives,
single-issue coalitions and other less rigidly organised or institutionalised
forms of civil society. A second requirement is that the government shows
itself to be open to input from civil society in all its forms. The example of
the platform set up for the introduction of the euro shows that the government
considers civil society relevant mainly for its contribution to the
implementation of policy. If it also recognises the importance of the representation
of community interests, it will have to assign this function its
proper value.
Accountability
Openness to organisations which do not form part of the traditional, institutionalised
structure is of indisputable importance in the activating of
the accountability function of civil society. It is, after all, more logical that
these organisations should fulfil the role of ‘thorn in the side’ than organisations
which have themselves become part of the system. Civil society
organisations have two ways of shaping this function and demanding
political accountability: via the specific interests they represent and via
their involvement in policy implementation.
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Identification
Because civil society organisations act on the basis of their own interests,
‘Europe’ as such is usually of little interest to them (Van den Berg and
Brandsen 2007: 31). These organisations are more concerned with specific,
relevant policies. This means that a substantial contribution to the development
of views on Europe as a political community should not be
expected from civil society. If civil society has a contribution to make to
identification processes, then this is above all a question of identification
‘by doing’ (Schmidt 2006). This means that civil society can acquire significance
among Dutch citizens mainly as a link that contributes to the identification
of citizens with Europe by being permanently recognisable in their
European role. The contribution to identification processes is an extension
of the role of civil society in representing community interests, demanding
accountability in respect to Dutch eu policy and being involved in the
content of that policy. It will thus become clear that achieving this is a
process that will take some time.