It's Prince's Day again. The discussions in the House of Representatives always receive a lot of attention on TV afterwards. However, Dutch politicians are rarely compelling orators. This has always been the case.
There is a cliché that the Dutch cannot speak. Look at the British or the French:what a reason they can deliver! In the summer of 2014, Frans Timmermans' speech at the United Nations about MH17 made a big impression, but it was not in Dutch. Is something like this also possible in the House of Representatives?
At the end of the eighteenth century, that would not have been a question. Of course a Dutch representative could speak, that's what he was there for, right? From 1796 the National Assembly met for several years in what is now called the Old Hall of the House of Representatives. For the first time, politics was discussed publicly in a formal institution. People crowded into the small public gallery.
A chair in 'Low German eloquence' was established in Leiden. The expectation was that the Dutch would emulate the powerful orators in the revolutionary French Assemblée Nationale, who played with their rhetorical violence in the enormous hall with its gigantic public stands.
Behind closed doors
It would turn out differently. The political excitement disappeared as the French claimed a greater role in the Netherlands. When the Netherlands regained its independence in 1813, the enthusiasm for compelling public politics had disappeared. The new polity, which was completed after merging with Belgium in 1815, consisted of components designed in the Batavian era (1795-1801):a constitution, a bicameral system and a constitutional monarchy.
Featured by the editors
MedicineWhat are the microplastics doing in my sunscreen?!
AstronomySun, sea and science
BiologyExpedition to melting land
But the Northern Dutch wanted to continue their old style of doing politics within that system. Calm consultations and compromises are made out of the public eye, as was done in the old States General. This meant no public eloquence, as the Belgians knew under French influence, but careful maneuvering without big words. Thorbecke's constitutional revision of 1848 brought a sharper debate, but still exclusively for the gentlemen among themselves in The Hague. Publicity mainly meant that you could read afterwards in the newspaper what was said in the House.
Does this development now confirm the lack of speaking skills of the Dutch? It depends on how you look at it. Because at the same time when so little effort was made in formal politics to captivate an audience, people flocked to see great pulpit orators speaking. The first half of the nineteenth century was a high point of pastoral eloquence, which was also echoed at public commemorations. However, this was completely forgotten by the Dutch afterwards, when that form of eloquence was regarded as bombastic exaggeration and fell out of fashion.
Political elite case
The lack of political rhetoric is mainly due to the Dutch conception of politics, which for a long time mainly focused on governance and consultation, not playing with the public. It was very different in France, where at the end of the eighteenth century during the revolution a tradition of audience-oriented eloquence emerged, including powerful gestures, echoing voices and compelling pathos.
Even when a political system of the same kind as in the Netherlands was introduced after the revolution, the great attention to eloquence remained. As a politician you had to be rhetorical, otherwise you wouldn't make it. In the noble salons, politics and especially orators were the talk of the day, and that conversation determined who was successful. The French House of Representatives, then called Chambre des députés, was not so much an administrative body, but the place for passionate debate, which was enjoyed by a distinguished audience.
In the Netherlands, Thorbecke said that the public matter should be dealt with publicly. For the Parisian elite, this meant first and foremost that you could enjoy great speeches and duels with words in the stands. Sometimes it was more about spectacle than about careful reasoning, but a good orator also had to be able to hold his own in a substantive debate on the cutting edge.
Both the French and Dutch political systems were modeled after the prestigious British Houses of Parliament. This has been debated for centuries, but in relative secrecy. It was not until the time of the French Revolution that the British system became official – still more reluctantly than in France.
Noisy election rallies
All this took place in a world with limited suffrage, where the masses were not yet decisive. But the tradition formed at that time also continued afterwards. In French democracy, great parliamentary eloquence would remain the norm for political leaders. In the meantime, popular orators also emerged in Dutch politics from the end of the nineteenth century. Barring exceptions, the norm remained calm in the House, but at election rallies things could get violent.
In the age of pillarization (society divided into separate groups of different faiths or political convictions, ed.) the leaders were expected to make inspiring speeches in their own circle. Until well into the twentieth century, Dutch politicians used the 'slightly reverberating sermon tone' of a preacher, as was still noticeable with, for example, the social democrat Joop den Uyl (1919-1987).
The Chamber itself remained the domain of distant exchange. MPs could treat each other sharply, but the real noise came from outsiders such as NSB members and communists, who were mostly ignored. After the Second World War (1940-1945) people started to worry about the accessibility of the parliamentary debate, but that only led to didactic considerations:'Let's explain it a bit better'.
Seek moral leadership
Is it bad that the House of Representatives has seldom had compelling orators and that for a long time it was not necessary for prime ministers and ministers to even debate urgently? Isn't politics supposed to regulate things and keep a close eye on the national interest? Isn't entertainment an afterthought? You can look at it that way, but such reasoning is based on the idea that the House does not have to represent the people directly.
For a long time, the Netherlands had political parties and pillars to represent the interests of the voters, but the latter have long since disappeared and the former have barely any social significance. All eyes are now on the government and the House. Then it suddenly matters a lot more how people speak here. It still doesn't have to be technically perfect, but the election debates and the major parliamentary debates already show that a smooth speaking style is a requirement for political leadership these days.
This is a recent development, but it has immediate effect. You can hardly imagine a leader of a major party who would do badly in that area. Speaking, however, is more a matter of technique and talent than of moral leadership. The latter has been somewhat lost after the disappearance of the pillarization and after the respect for politicians has diminished.
Wim Kok (b. 1938) was still able to retain political authority with a somewhat paternal appearance. That style may be outdated, but the need for politicians who can make a moral appeal is still there. Not with ideological considerations, but with a personal story that the public takes with them because they can believe in it.
In the British and French politics of the nineteenth century, it was not the clever or ingenious art of debating that was regarded as the highest attainable, but the ability to 'move' the audience. Today, as it was then, this is an art that few in Dutch politics are given. It is a political force that can be dangerous, but also one that can have major positive effects.