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.

A large number of Dutch policy areas is governed by institutionalized European policy networks and European laws and rules. Various forms of multi-level governance have emerged that were seemingly unforeseen at the time when the field of European integration studies was preoccupied by the fierce debates between intergouvernmentalists and supernationalists. Nevertheless, the field has hitherto given little attention to how europeanisation has affected national civil service systems. This article kicks off this special issue with an overview of the recent literature on the effects of Europeanisation on national civil service systems.

It is often claimed, that there is a clear relationship between the Dutch experience with the 'pillarization' of national minorities in the nineteenth and twentieth century, and the 'integration' of ethnic minorities in Dutch society by government policies since the 1970s. This claim has never been substantiated though. In this article, the relationship is examined systematically on the basis of an analytical distinction between the 'organizational principles' and the 'rules of the game' of pillarization. It is concluded that traces of the organizational principles and the rules of the game of pillarization can, indeed, clearly be found in the minority policies of the 1970s and 1980s, but that since the early 1990s a process of 'de-pillarization' of government policies has set in. The article shows that in the early twenty-first century the experience with pillarization can hardly be traced in the minority policies.

This article examines the differences and similarities in public policy of the Dutch and Belgian government in the policy field of socially responsible investing (SRI). In particular the authors discuss both the content and the consequences of the Dutch arrangement 'Groen beleggen' and the Belgian 'Kringloopfonds'. Our empirical evidence states that, although both public policies are very similar (a tax incentive for investors investing financial means in socially responsible funds), they had a different influence on the socially responsible investment market. The Dutch arrangement 'Groen beleggen' lead to more assets under management, more green private funds, more financed projects and a bigger influence on the market of socially responsible investment products. This is mainly caused by the nature of the funding: the choice for private funds in the Netherlands, instead of a public fund like in Belgium.

Decision-making in the Netherlands is generally characterised as (neo) corporatist. Whether stakeholders enjoy a similar level of access to, and influence on the formulation of the national position, which the Dutch government advocates in Brussels, remains however unclear. This article aims at providing a first tentative answer to this question by studying the formulation of the Dutch position on EU resolution 882/2004 concerning the official controls on compliance with feed and food law, animal health and animal welfare.

In-depth analysis of this case reveals that the development process of the Dutch stance on 882/2004 was largely devoid of stakeholder-input. As such, this process may be characterised as essentially etatist rather than corporatist. Moreover, it was established – as expected – that specialised lobby groups – those that could offer additional information and expertise to the dossier team responsible for 882/2004 – were able to exert more influence than general advocacy groups. Finally, the hypothesis that openness leads to more stakeholder-influence was not confirmed in this case. To the contrary, only during private bilateral discussion did a selection of business organizations manage to convince the dossier team of the benefits of limited border controls.

Over the last decades, the number of European Union member states has significantly increased, resulting into a reduction of the relative formal power of the Dutch government. Improving Dutch influence in Brussels is therefore an important topic on the agenda of public administration scholars and advisory boards. Using experts at the various stages of the EU policymaking process is one option to increase the influence in the EU. This article evaluates the effectiveness of this strategy concerning one of the most complex and most controversial public policy issues in the history of the European Union: the revision of the EU's chemical policy (REACH). The article demonstrates that the 'expert strategy' has been successful in this case. However, the effectiveness of this strategy comes under pressure if the trend towards core departments will continue.

Governing the Netherlands seems to have become a form of governing by commission. Between 1995 and 2005 Dutch central government installed at least 364 commissions that we were able to identify. Cuts in this phenomenon are often called for by its opponents since commissions are often believed to be a strategic instrument for policymaker to cut democratic corners or slow down policy making processes. Dutch Parliament by motion has even asked government to keep from forming (so many) commissions. Still trends have not changed and new commissions are being formed almost every other week. Apparently there are compelling reasons for forming commissions. In this article we discuss how societal and public context lead to the installation of commissions. Furthermore we argue that installation of a commission can be clearly understood from the motives officials have with its formation. Hiring expertise (60%), independence of members (30%) and creating legitimacy (20%) are important factors regarding these motivations. Timing of commissions within election cycles is strategic: installation shortly after the new administration is effective, as is reporting back before the next elections. As long as politics remains politics calling for less commissions has mostly symbolic value.

Uncertainties about climate change are a major incentive for the Dutch government to communicate frequently about risks related to water safety. In September 2008, the 'New Delta Committee' even presented several coping strategies to safeguard the low-lying Delta of The Netherlands far into the next century. The government assumes that increased high water risk awareness and behaviour in society, based on a risk-based approach, is an important factor for sustainable future living with water and thus made this into the spearhead of policy. However, the main part of Dutch society still lives in a flush of victory. The Delta Works symbolize the victory over the water; The Netherlands is safe. The government doesn't succeed satisfactorily to realize high water risk awareness and behaviour in its society, notwithstanding years of campaigning. Cultural sociologists Heems and Kothuis demonstrate by means of a discourse analysis of public campaigns that government communication on high water safety is not only entangled but also creates confusion. Reason of the entanglement in communication is a breakthrough of the taboo on publicly speaking of a flood disaster as a realistic scenario. The confusion obstructs the Dutch government to bridge the gap in perception between itself and society and to achieve its policy objectives.

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.