The EU is transforming the function and power of the Dutch parliament as an institution, and the way in which its principal actors, the governing and opposition parliamentary party groups, interact with each other and the government. This article seeks to address the question: How does parliamentary scrutiny over EU decision-making function in the Netherlands and how has this new role for parliament changed both parliamentary and executive relations in the country and the interaction of parties in parliament? For the purposes of this research, this paper uses the typology of King. The author has conducted a number of in-depth interviews with Dutch MPs. Overall, this article concludes the process of parliamentary scrutiny over EU matters in the Netherlands is no longer exclusively about finding a national consensus towards the outside world, but increasingly mirrors the rough and tumble of normal, domestic politics.

The displacement of political decision making from the classic bodies of representative democracy to non democratically legitimised arenas is a major threat to contemporary representative democracy. In this essay, three displacements are discussed: from parliamentary to deliberative processes, from political to professional decision making, and from national to international arenas. Several of the safeguards that have been developed in parliamentary democracy over the past centuries, such as representation, transparency, majority voting, and public accountability, are missing or are underdeveloped in these new arenas. The essay explores how these safeguards could be introduced into these new arenas and concludes that the displacement of politics should be attended by a dissemination of democracy.

This article poses the question whether the Dutch system of organized interest representation faces a transformation from neo-corporatist mediation to lobbyism similar to Scandinavian countries. Its main claim is that this has so far not been the case, because two essential features of neo-corporatist interest mediation have remained prominent in the Netherlands. First, policies regarding labour conditions continue to be determined within a network of employers' organisations, trade unions, and the government that is essentially closed to outsiders. Second, the system continues to be hierarchical in nature: the government, often below the surface, demonstrates a considerable capacity to steer the participants in its preferred direction. Such a closed network still allows for lobbying the parliament by both network members and outsiders. Lobbying may thus be complementary to closed neo-corporatist networks rather than a substitute. The article offers a research agenda exploring the latter suggestion.

This paper provides an overview of the results of Scandinavian research into the lobbying activities of interest organisations. The paper is based on the reports of Danish and Norwegian scholars. These studies suppose that an association exists between the downfall of corporatist decision-making and policy implementation (among others observed in the decreasing number of boards, councils, and commissions), the increasing influence of parliament, and the increase in lobbying by interest organisations. The most important empirical evidence for this association is presented and discussed.

This article distinguished between three fundamental processes of collective decision-making as collective production in social systems: (1) persuasion; (2) exchange and (3) coercion. The conditions under which these processes are dominant are described, as well as the type of network that is central to each of the processes. Corporatism and lobbyism appear to be two polarities of collective decision-making. In corporatism interest groups are directly involved in final decision making through formal and informal institutions whereas in lobbyism final decision making is delegated to independent persons. In corporatist decision-making, mutual interests dominate conflicting interests. Thus, a failure of reaching consensus becomes unattractive and consensus is guaranteed through the formal norm of majority decision-making and the informal norm of unanimity. When mutual interests dominate over conflicting interests, lobbyism is reflected by the interactions between lobby activists and civil servants and politicians who share the same position. Ad hoc lobbyism will arise when conflicts of interests dominate and a non-cooperative game exists in which (temporal) coalitions must be built.

This article discusses the degree to which Dutch environmental policy exhibits a shift from corporatism to lobbyism. Based on a general analysis of environmental policy making in the Netherlands and two specific cases of environmental decision making, the author draws the conclusion that such a shift has not happened. At the level of policymaking it is rather the opposite: in the 1980s the Ministry of the Environment introduced a certain level of corporatism. This was possible because of a clear framework of environmental policy goals shaped by the National Institute for Public Health and Environment (RIVM), because the environmental movement began to see the Ministry as an ally and because business interests preferred self-regulation (one element of corporatism) to government regulations. In two concrete case of environmental decision-making that are discussed here, environmental goals are being discussed once more. During such discussion, it appears that Dutch ministries have close connection to 'their' target groups. For the coming years, environmental policy will 'Europeanize' further and Dutch economic interest groups, although being remarkably late in responding to this shift, will start to influence the Brussels policymaking game instead of the Dutch implementation game.

Recently in The Netherlands, as in other countries, many have called for administrative and democratic reform. The perspectives implicated in the arguments for change differ, however. Some argue for a strengthening of mechanisms of control and accountability. Others opt for more – and more direct – citizen participation in governance. In effect, these perspectives often contradict. In this article we will look into J.S. Mill's effort to combine such different perspectives. It is shown that in his considerations on good government a third principle is active: administrative competence or quality. Mill, thus, makes us aware of a deficiency in many contemporary evaluations of administrative and democratic renewal.