The Christian Democrats hold the key to the coalition talks, but how much pain can the party endure, writes Giles Scott-Smith on The Holland Bureau.

“It is hard for thee to kick against the pricks”
Acts 9: 5-6
The prick in biblical times was the wooden spike used to goad the oxen to plough the field. If the ox resisted, the spike would be applied a little harder. More resistance, more pain.
This remarkable cabinet formation process has now reached the point where everything hinges on the outlook of the Christian Democrats. The upcoming party congress will effectively decide whether the leadership’s decision to work with the PVV – even if they are not actually together in government – can go ahead.
One can be cynical – party congresses, heavily manipulated and passaged, rarely overturn decisions already taken, especially if power is in the offing. But the divisions within the party for and against are very real. The enforced silence surrounding the cabinet talks, preventing any hint of what concessions Wilders may be forced to make, only heighten the tension and further emphasise the issue as one of principle not policy.
The party has not had to delve this deep into its soul since its first period in government (1977-81), when seven CDA ‘loyalists’ professed their aim to support the VVD-CDA cabinet so long as it stayed true to the christian principles of their party. Unusually, international politics were central in this, concerning the use of nuclear weapons and their place in Dutch (Western) security policy.
Will there be CDA ‘loyalists’ in 2010? It is quite possible. A VVD-CDA minority cabinet (54 seats) with support from the PVV (24 seats) reaches a parliamentary majority of one, slim enough to collapse on matters of principle.
But there is more than principle at stake here, despite the claims of the original loyalists interviewed in Trouw yesterday, and despite the CDA petitioners who associate cooperation with the PVV with undermining constitutional rights, such as the freedom of religion. The 1970s loyalists were determined not to split the party, and played their principled game always with that in mind. The current situation is much more unstable.
Wilders has been very successful in taking voters away from the CDA, as the election results in Limburg – Verhagen’s backyard – fully demonstrated. And the CDA’s success in attracting support from cultural minorities is now threatened by its apparent preparedness to sell their rights down the river.
When Fortuyn came on the scene in 2002 he took votes from the VVD and the PvdA, with CDA as the safe haven for the undecided voter wanting stability. Now the CDA has lost that vote-winning haven. An optimist would say the VVD has temporarily become the safe bet, which CDA will regain in time.
Playing the constitutional card will wake up the sensitive citizen and they will ‘do the right thing’ next time around. A pessimist on the other hand would speculate that Dutch voting behaviour has become so volatile that the whole notion of ’safe havens’ is no longer relevant. (needless to say, the notion of safe havens and Dutch politics is an uncomfortable combination at present, as the recent decision by the state prosecutor to investigate the Dutch military’s association with the Serb destruction of Srebrenica and Goradze painfully brought home).
The CDA is therefore caught in a vice. Following its own regent-like identity and choosing for government means risking introducing painful public spending cuts and potentially losing more ground to a ‘blameless’ PVV. Rejecting this option means occupying the opposition benches with a rowdy PVV out to score points at any opportunity.
The only way ahead, the gamble of Verhagen, is that this whole cabinet formation process will force the normalisation of the PVV, reforming its agenda, and reducing its support as a protest movement.
A chance meeting with a PVV-voting acquaintance a couple of days ago offered an opportunity to delve a little into this scenario. (for your information – being still on holiday, I did not want to talk politics. He brought it up, knowing full well we occupied different standpoints). The person in question, a former dyed-in-the-wool VVD’er turned Fortuynist, brough a whole new and rather scabrous meaning to the idea of kicking against the pricks.
Two issues dominated the discussion. One was the lack of democracy within the PVV itself. My point that the party only contains two members, and that this control-freakery would surely complicate things should Wilders have to tolerate a PVV minister other than himself, was brushed aside as an irrelevant detail.
Lack of members wouldn’t affect how they govern, and anyway ‘Wilders had a list of ministers in his back pocket already on 10 June’ was the answer (so we were told was my silent reply). The second issue was the intriguing nature of the PVV’s left + right agenda: Anti-immigration and defence of the health system.
If the PVV wins out on some of its rightist demands, won’t it lose support from the lower incomes if in return it caves in to the VVD’s heavy public spending cutbacks? Isn’t the Verhagen strategy correct?
The answer to this was the clincher. Oh, does Wilders demand fewer cutbacks? My PVV-supporting acquaintance claimed to lack the figures and didn’t know. It was late by then and a couple of glasses of wine led me to utter the word ‘bollocks’, realising quickly it was time for bed. But the cat was already out of the bag.
Wilders’ appeal may indeed come from parts of his agenda. But it comes above all from his prime-time media-orientated ability to raise mayhem at every turn. So the PVV agenda is contradictory? So a lack of party members means Wilders has to search for funding abroad? So the PVV has no members in the First Chamber of parliament?
You can go on and its always missing the point. He may well be ex-VVD, a member of parliament since 1997, a Hague insider, but he’s staked his entire identity on ripping it all up. Why else would support for the PVV go up after he abandoned his stance on defending the pension age at 65? Because pensions are irrelevant.
What counts is calling the bluff of his political enemies who think he leads a ‘normal’ party with a ‘normal’ support base. Giving the finger to the CDA and the PvdA counts more for GW supporters than running a coherent programme.
Dutch parliamentary expert Henk te Velde may think there’s no tradition of populism in the Netherlands, but I beg to differ. There has always been an undercurrent of resistance within a (generally) well-run country of regents and monarchs, and this occasionally bursts out into the open. Since WW II the Provos would be a fine example, as would the squatter movement in the 70s and 80s.
Ok, I’m stretching things to link anarchic social movements with an anti-establishment ’party’ on the verge of government (probably been reading too much Greil Marcus), but I think there could be something to it. Its not similarity of agenda, its similarity of disdain for established authority. Wilders is turning this into a political art form, and it looks like a big section of the Dutch electorate will follow him whichever way he turns as a result.
For more from Giles Scott-Smith, click here