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

ediscovering europe in the netherlands
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present discourse needs to first of all be opened up to more views, considerations
and standpoints on the problems, solutions, responsibilities and
agenda of the European policy arena, of which the member states have
formed an inextricable part for decades. In other words, the discourse must
embrace all of the different facets of a policy. Secondly, these views and
considerations on policy must be linked to a vision of the eu as a political
community (polity). Thus, in an ideal political discourse, it is not only a
question of which policy will fit into the European arena that is important,
but also how that policy relates to the ‘Europe’ that people wish to achieve
and along which pathway that ‘Europe’ can be realised (Van Apeldoorn
2007). What the substance, direction and nature of European co-operation
should be can no longer be left unsaid or regarded as automatic, but needs
to be constantly articulated, argued and established. Moreover, this needs
to be linked to views on the desired development of the eu as a political
community. Unless this link is established between tangible policy ambitions,
on the one hand, and opinions on the eu as a political system, on the
other, the political discourse is in danger of becoming bogged down in
elevated abstractions (‘the federal union’), doomsday scenarios (‘the superstate’)
or grand visions (the peace and reconciliation project). None of these
ideas fit in completely with the contemporary reality of the eu as a
complex, multi level and increasingly politicised administrative system.
The often highly subtle way in which the national and European dimensions
of policy domains are interwoven, the diversity of institutional
arrangements and the different ways in which national and European
actors are involved, are becoming more difficult to capture under a
common header. Therefore, the challenge for political parties is to link the
views expressed regarding actual problems and the opinions of their grassroots
supporters with their own profiles and to then link them to views
concerning the further development of the eu. This type of approach
would avoid an over-fixation on purely institutional issues, which are far
removed from the problems, wishes and views of citizens. This is the
substantive ‘route’ via which the role of political parties ought to become
manifest.
The wrr notes that, while these visions already exist to some extent, they
have yet to reach the majority of citizens. One reason is because the traditional
discourse of Dutch politicians is totally inadequate because of its
strong preference for internal policy co-ordination. Dutch politicians are
not used to pursuing a persuasive communicative discourse on Europe,
which also meets the concerns of its citizens. The referendum campaign on
the Constitutional Treaty is a textbook example of poor political communication
(Aarts and Van de Kolk 2005). The governing parties and most of the
Cabinet members not only voiced their positions far too late in the debate,