In the Netherlands at January 1^st 2015 municipalities will most likely receive administrative and financial responsibility for work, youth and societal support. Anticipating this change almost all large municipalities have introduced social neighbourhood teams, inspired by the successful model of the ‘Achter-de-Voordeur-aanpak’ (Dutch for ‘Behind the Front Door-approach’). In this article the authors reflect on this development, because of criticisms about the vagueness surrounding the social teams and with its further development in mind. In a historical analysis they look at this phenomenon in relation to its political and policy context. The central research question is the change in vision that has occurred since the first experiments with neighbourhood social teams and the implications for their design. The authors show how the focus in the policy discourse has gradually moved to arguments concerning the efficiency of the societal support, more self-responsibility and self-direction and more participation in the society and the labour process. This makes a different model for neighbourhood teams desirable, especially in terms of (1) the target group of the approach, (2) the depth of the support and (3) the role of the generalist and the room for manoeuvre or the powers this generalist receives. A lot of municipalities choose to discover gradually what works. Next to the time pressure this might explain the vagueness of the plans for the design and organization of neighbourhood teams.

The Netherlands is engaged in reforming several of its public service provision sectors by limiting their hybrid (mixed public/private) character. This special issue deals with these reforms. We have a closer look at the systems of transport, education and housing, and also discuss reforms of the Dutch nation state. Each article poses three basic questions: why has the sector evolved as it has? Why is change seen as necessary? And how does this process take place? By doing so, we draw general lessons on how the Netherlands deals with system change and public management reform.

More than twelve years after the appearance of the report of the Dutch Committee on the Future of Government Communication (‘Commissie Toekomst Overheidscommunicatie’) communication as the responsibility of the government is an important issue of debate and a discipline that is alive and kicking. We may even conclude that communication – in the terminology of this report – has conquered a place in the heart of policy. A lot is still unclear about the communicative function of government. On the normative question ‘why should the government communicate’ diverging answers are possible. However, the question is hardly discussed in practice and in science. For this reason the positioning of government communication as a separate discipline is also unclear. Reflection on the elementary values behind the discipline can reveal themes that have been invisible so far. The article investigates which values and motives are attached in theory and in practice to communication as a governmental function. For this reason a content analysis has been carried out of a number of volumes of five Dutch magazines (practical and scientific). The authors conclude that for professionals communication mainly is an instrument to support policy goals. The possibility to make a purposeful contribution with government communication to democratic values hardly is brought about, not so much in Communication Science as in Public Administration.

Interview with Gert-Jan Buitendijk, director-general Administration and Kingdom Relations at the Ministry of the Interior and Kingdom Relations.

Over the past decade, policy attention for ‘active citizenship’ and ‘bottom up’ citizen initiatives has strongly increased. Nowadays, governments tend to approach citizens more and more as practical ‘doers’: as active citizens that can initiate projects in the public domain – for instance to increase the livability of their neighborhood. The dominant policy perspective on what is called the ‘democracy of action’ is one of a small government (to make room for a ‘big society’) that is not directive but supportive to active citizens.
In this article, we first argue that in practice we observe two ‘silent ideologies’ that suppress this policy perspective of the democracy of action. We call these the silent ideologies of ‘professional centralism’ and of ‘instrumental support’; we claim that in practice these ideologies enable the dominance of professionals over citizen initiatives (and nót that of the citizens). Second we state that the policy perspective of the democracy of action itself contains a silent ideology: it assumes a highly depoliticized form of citizenship. In the short term, this may be convenient for administrators and policy makers but in the long run this can lead to a less democracy because the voices of critical citizens are not heard.

Values like quality of life, efficiency of services, solidarity in finances and privacy of clients are being compromised continuously in daily practices, inspired by opinions and ideology of (groups of) individuals. Yet, systems like healthcare are dominated by technocratic procedures to enforce transparency and efficiency. This functional rationality pushes away the more fundamental debates on values. This doesn’t mean they are not being compromised, but it’s done in a hidden way. It’s the nurse taking decisions on the amount of time available for a patient. Although restricted by procedures nurses compromise differently. The same counts for healthcare executives in their boardrooms. Restricted by system requirements they take decisions differently, inspired by their convictions. It is all ‘hidden ideology’ in institutions, interactions and intuitions. Even the political arena is imprisoned by the self made technocratic way of debating and deciding on important societal issues. Political debates should be about the values behind procedures instead of technocratic in its essence. Critical checks and balances have to be reinstalled (or reanimated) in political decision making in order to do this and meet patients’ or citizens’ needs, instead of maintaining a procedural attitude that drives politics and ideology away from society.

The recent scholarly debate on policies and discourses with regard to citizenship in the Netherlands point to a moralization or culturalization of citizenship. This article aims to contribute to this debate by zooming into the current contents of citizenship education. We make a comparative analysis of the contents of textbooks for citizenship education that are used for civic integration courses for migrants and for primary and secondary school students in the Netherlands. Our findings show that citizenship has indeed gained a moral content in both contexts but that the difference lies in the norms that are stressed and how they are conveyed to the target population of future citizens. Whereas civic integration books for migrants emphasize the importance of learning local procedures and habits in order to belong to the Dutch national community, primary and secondary school books underscore the importance of dealing with cultural diversity in the multicultural society.

This article investigates whether the local practices growing under the Wet Maatschappelijke Ondersteuning (Wmo; Law for social participation) can be viewed as examples of ‘transformation of the welfare state’-in-action. The article argues that indeed, a number of Dutch cities is trying to create a shift in the balance of responsibilities of citizens, social networks, civil society and government that can be judged an operationalization of the more abstract recommendations of many ‘welfare state reformers’. It remains to be seen however, whether these attempts will actually result in change. There are both practical problems and fundamental questions to be tackled. The question whether the transformation wished for by many from a political perspective, is actually feasible (given the political and societal constraints) should be addressed firmly by both local and national actors.As it goes, the opposite is the case: the question of the feasibility of the Wmo seems to have vanished in the void between parliament and municipalities.

Behind many notions of ‘governance’, there lies the image of a ‘modest’ or ‘retreating’ state. The assumption is that local and national authorities can only perform effectively if in cooperation with other public and private actors. Generally, it is said, governments increasingly lack the legitimacy for top-down interventions and hence the need of including participative citizen involvement in policy making and implementation. In recent years this democratic image has been disputed in scientific debates because of its lack of attention for new forms of interventionism by the state in societal processes, e.g. crime, youth care, immigration and integration. In this article, we aim to contribute to this other understanding of modern governance by analysing Dutch political discourse between 2001 and 2010 on (implicit) notions of the role and responsibility of the state. We show how the idea of ‘responsibilisation’ of citizens is turned into an argument for more instead of less state involvement in societal processes and citizens’ lives. By emphasizing ‘shared responsibilities’ between government and society, a tricky picture of parity is sketched of this relation. Dutch government presents itself as ‘an ally’ of citizens in fighting pressing social problems, but in the meantime an ideal of ‘responsible behaviour’ is constructed, namely, citizen behaviour in concordance with government’s policy ambitions. Within this political discourse, the socio-liberal idea of ‘responsibility’ turns into ‘responsibilisation on government’s terms’ and ‘irresponsible’ behaviour becomes a legitimate focal point for deep state interventions through techniques of governance.

A main motive for policy decentralization is the belief that municipalities are better able to customize public policy to local circumstances, and to realize made-to-measure service provision. In this respect, the introduction of the Social Support Act (Wmo) is an interesting example. With the lack of ‘vertical’ accountability obligations to the national government, the Wmo is governmentally innovative. Whether the decentralization results in customized forms of social support is a fascinating one because a detailed reading of the Wmo and its implementation displays possible incentives as well as barriers to made-to-measure service provision. The empirical exploration in this article uses data from the 2007-2009 evaluation of the Wmo conducted by the Netherlands Institute for Social Research (SCP). The evaluation shows that municipalities involve diverse stakeholders in formulating Wmo policy, and that their involvement seems to lead to customized service provision. At the same time, municipalities follow nationwide models, and information provided by the central government seems to have a major impact on local social care policy. The article concludes with an outlook on future directions in local debates on social care and the recommendation to give time for major decentralization trajectories such as the Wmo.

For many years now, citizenship has been a hot topic in Dutch politics. The activation and participation of citizens has been part and parcel of many policy initiatives. In this fashion, the current cabinet of Prime Minister Rutte has stressed the virtues of a ‘big society’ and a ‘small government’. We call this the new civility: a citizenship philosophy in which an ethico-economic claim of self-sufficiency is accompanied by a strong anticipation of policy conformity. Notably, the democratic legitimation of the new civility has been reversed. Now it is government which demands civic accountability, not the other way around. Responsible citizenship, not responsible government is at its heart. Furthermore, the new civility is based on a reversal of the Mandevillean idea of private vices and public benefits. We illustrate its ambiguous strands by a case study of a citizen’s initiative project in the city of Dordrecht. We conclude by showing how the tension between the values of civil self-sufficiency and policy conformity ironically can turn out in a-political conception of citizenship.

In recent years the Dutch welfare state has invested substantial sums of money in activation of citizen’s initiatives in deprived neighbourhoods. As a policy concept citizen’s initiatives refers to enhancements by citizens to the quality of life in their neighbourhood. Is this activation policy productive or counterproductive for citizen participation? This question is answered by analyzing the representativeness of the activated citizens, the nature of their initiatives, the type of relations they develop with institutions, and whether they develop more competences due to their initiative(s). Our findings indicate that the activated citizens are more often female, below 50, lower educated, and 40 percent is migrant, which makes them more representative than the participation elite (male, 50+, white, and higher educated). They form a new vanguard that activates many participants through initiatives that focus on connecting people and on social problems such as anonymity, isolation and nuisance. Many contacts with professionals contribute for them to a partnership relation geared toward cooperation instead of consumerism or dissatisfaction. Also these citizens develop democratic, bureaucratic and social competences as well as social reflexivity and empathy for other citizens and institutions. We conclude that activation of citizen’s initiatives has positive effects on citizen participation.

Since 1994, the concept of citizenship is a central concept in Dutch Integration policy for immigrants and their descendants. Gradually, the concept has become a moral category of good and active citizenship, associated with all kinds of obligations. Since the turn of the century it is even used to urge on – especially – Muslims to assimilate to mainstream culture and fundamental norms and values. This contrasts sharply with the Dutch multicultural policy of the 1980s. How is it possible for political and policy discourse to change in such a radical way within a few decades? And what role played the concept of citizenship in these changes? This article seeks to answer these questions by investigating how the concept of citizenship has been interpreted and applied differently over time in Dutch discourse on integration policy, focussing on issues of unity versus ethno-cultural diversity. With this purpose, first, the concept of citizenship is defined and differentiated in four dimensions and various perspectives. Next, Dutch political and policy discourse of the last 25 years is examined in broad lines. Subsequently, the Dutch discourse is analysed in more detail in debates of the last decades on dual nationality and on civic integration policy.

The problem of climate change is high on the various political-administrative agendas, both national and international. At the same time the problem is full of uncertainties and controversies. Adaptation to climate change asks for adjustments in our spatial planning, but can also necessitate changes in the distribution of public and private responsibilities. A crucial question is how the legitimacy of adaptation measures can be organized in a context surrounded with uncertainties, controversies and conflicting interests. In this paper we introduce the central theme of this special issue and the various contributions.

This article sketches four more or less excluding future scenarios with regard to immigration and social security. Its objective is to find an answer to the question how the Dutch welfare state and more in particular the system of social security can contribute positively to both labour market participation and social integration of non-western immigrants. The four scenarios, constructed on the basis of two dichotomies open versus closed country borders and privatised versus collective social security, can be perceived as ideal types. Although none of the four scenarios will contribute unequivocally to solving the problem of labour market participation and social integration of immigration, it turns out that two scenarios will be more realistic, given in particular the long-term development of the social security system towards further privatisation. These are the scenarios that combine privatised social security with open or closed borders. The first scenario will be more beneficial from an economic viewpoint. By contrast, the second scenario will be more attractive for those people who primarily want to restrict immigration.

This article discusses the changes in the safety policy in the Netherlands over about the last fifteen years. These changes are analysed as reactions to the problems that the police and other criminal justice agencies face and which result from the shift from a modern to a late modern society. Five main changes are distinguished: in the organisational and managerial arrangements of the police; in the relation between the state (police) and other (both public and private) agencies; the rise of extra-judicial instruments and the growing attention for the position of victims; the increasing use of technological instruments for surveillance and crime prevention; and a harsher and more punitive policy. These changes create new fundamental questions for a future safety policy.

Over recent years, we have seen a steady increase in the number of security officers and city supervisors in Dutch urban areas. However, despite the mounting presence and visibility of these auxiliary patrols, little is known about how citizens perceive and value them. A questionnaire held among a sample of 761 residents of Amsterdam shows that citizens have mixed opinions. Many people are accepting or neutral about the occurrence of security officers and city supervisors in urban space, but at the same time lack a clear idea of their quality and professionalism. This somewhat ignorant and laconic attitude raises the question whether people underestimate the potential consequences of omnipresent quasi-police. It is argued that more repressive approaches may generate substantial conflicts with the general public. Furthermore, safety and security may become 'consumer goods' in the sense that people are quite happy to leave their responsibilities to paid policing professionals – a position which promotes the rise of a 'culture of control'.