In the near future a growing number of Dutch regions and municipalities will experience a decline in population and household numbers. However, compared with other countries, the impending population shrinkage in the Netherlands will be modest, if not insignificant. The spatial consequences of this demographic decline will be limited. Other factors, such as economic growth, behavioural change and spatial planning policy, will have a more important influence on spatial development. The fixation on population numbers in both the public debate about demographic decline and in policy-making is therefore misplaced and futile. Insofar as demographic trends already have an influence on spatial developments, it is primarily through changes in household numbers and population composition, for example in relation to housing needs. This does not mean that demographic decline will not raise issues pertinent to spatial development policy. In municipalities and regions, falling household numbers may push up housing vacancy rates and exacerbate segregation, leading to a reduction in the quality of the living environment. These negative consequences will be concentrated in specific districts, neighbourhoods and villages. Demographic decline is not only a threat; it also presents opportunities. In regions currently suffering from serious housing shortages, a shrinking number of households will relieve pressure on the housing market. In addition, contraction of local and regional populations will open up opportunities for reducing densities and 'greening' these neighbourhoods. When anticipating or responding to demographic decline, local and regional governments mainly adopt a strategy of improving the quality of the housing stock and stimulating employment. In both cases, there is a danger of competition between local authorities (or regions and provinces), which may lead to uneconomic spatial investments and irreversible spatial developments.

Over the past years the European Commission has undergone it most significant changes since its inception. Internal reforms and a long series of treaty revisions have transformed the relationship of commissioners and that of their top officials. This paper describes how the emergence of new rules and recruiting patterns and a change in role interpretations have contributed to a growing demarcation between the political and administrative spheres in the European Commission.

In local government, traditions and styles of working are under pressure. Local administrators try to find new methods to address urban matters in a business-like manner, to direct networks and to activate stakeholders. In that way, they strive for better performance, and for 'new' politics. In order to succeed, not only new methods are introduced, but cultures are changed as well and new traditions of governance are established. Existing styles of working and regular procedures are seen as outdated and considered to be barriers that have to be eliminated. This 'violence of renewal', as we call it, is based on several assumptions. First, new methods are seen as crucial for modernizing local governance. Second, the effects of new methods depend on the manner in which modernization takes place. Third, effective introductions of new methods do not happen straightforwardly; cultural change is required. In this article we will argue that these assumptions have to be put into perspective and, especially, that the idea of 'making' of cultures in order to effectively implement new methods is illusory. We show, based on research in four municipalities, that interventions in local governance as such are culturally biased, and that local traditions, styles and customs influence how modernization takes place.

This article analyzes the attention to democratic performance and the functioning of public administration by governments in the Netherlands. The views of national governments on these matters have not been mapped systematically. Through a content analysis of all annual Dutch Queen's speeches between 1945 and 2007, which is part of our broader research on the national politics of attention, we analyze the pattern of attention for democracy and public administration. The theoretical perspective used is the model of policy generations. Our findings show that governmental attention for the functioning of public administration emerged in the 1960s and since then went up and down. The time intervals in which agenda changes occurred often were longer than the duration of individual governments, although some governments contributed strongly to a change in attention and tone. Attention not only showed rise and decline, also the emphasis on efficiency, long term planning, and democratization shifted considerably from one period to the next. This empirical pattern matches for the most part the theory of policy generations, which predicts a fixed sequence in policy emphasis. In addition to general cultural driving forces central to this theoretical model, we conclude that political and institutional conditions contribute to a better understanding of the pattern of political attention.