Samenvatting

During the last decades, election campaigns in Western Europe have undergone major changes. In response to an altered electoral market, political parties have started to campaign more offensively, making use of campaign tactics such as negative campaigning. Negative campaigning strongly conflicts with the political culture of consensus and cooperation that is inherent to many West European political systems, especially in the Netherlands, in which coalition building has always been a necessity. Taking the Netherlands as a case-in-point, this article demonstrates that even in a consensual multiparty system like the Dutch one negative campaigning is on the rise. Indeed, by exploring the last four election campaigns this study demonstrates that negative campaigning is part-and-parcel of the Dutch electoral politics ever since 2002.