Holland: The land of legal pot and unionized sex workers. It's also, of course, a truly diverse society that includes people from Africa, the Caribbean, South America, and Asia. As author Russell Shorto has argued, Dutch values of tolerance and diversity are what first helped New York -- when it was Dutch New Amsterdam -- to become a diverse, cosmopolitan world center.
But Holland is also the political stage for Geert Wilders. Once an obscure parliamentary page for the liberal People's Party for Freedom and Democracy (VVD), he is now a minority party leader whose anti-Muslim rhetoric has been causing tension between Holland and the Middle East. Sure, his right-wing Party for Freedom (PVV) only has nine seats out of 150 in the lower house, but analysts and polls show that it is growing. Progressives should take note.
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Wilders made waves earlier this year by suggesting that half the pages of Koran should be ripped out. He also proposed a vote of no confidence on two Muslim ministers, and said that he feared the day when Muslims would become ministers. His motion lost in a landslide, but it was enough to ruffle the feathers of several Middle Eastern governments. And he makes his philosophy clear. "I believe not all cultures are equal," Wilders said in a phone interview. "Our values of Christianity and Judaism are better than Islamic values."
Wilders has other policy stances, including harsher prison sentences and closer ties with the United States. But his overall approach and appeal marks him as the new Pim Fortuyn, the charismatic politician whose anti-Muslim stances made him notorious until he was assassinated in 2002. Anti-immigrant tenets define the party's politics. He hasn't called for ethnic cleansing, but his language about cultural superiority and his claims that Muslims pollute national purity have some disturbing historical resonances. "I really see parallels with what happened in the Second World War," said Sam Cherribi, a former member of parliament with the VVD. "It's pretty problematic."
Wilders utilizes real problems and policy predicaments to garner public support, citing, for example, high crime rates among Muslim immigrants. And certainly the Muslim population is growing rapidly in Holland. As Tim Shah, a fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations, notes, immigrants have higher rates of reproduction than Dutch non-immigrants. (Currently, more than five percent of the population is Muslim.) And centrist and left-wing politicians have been unable to address such rapid changes effectively while attempting to make their societies open to Muslim immigrants. "Mainline politicians in Europe have not found a way to narrate a multicultural Europe," said Douglas Holmes, an anthropologist at the State University of New York at Binghamton who studies right-wing political movements.
That's a problem, because while the law tempers public political debate in Europe (for example, it is illegal to publicly deny the Holocaust in many counties), what is said in casual settings has less limits. And Wilders hopes to tap into this. "There is this deeper racist discourse that is acceptable in Europe," Holmes said.
Wilders boasted of a recent poll showing his party garnering 10 percent of the public's support, up from six at the last parliamentary election. "My party is growing, doubling in a couple of months' time," Wilders said.
Even though Holland is thought of as a tolerant, liberal country, Shah sees the rise of Wilders and the PVV as consistent with real traditions in Dutch history. Fundamentalist Calvinists have been pivotal to the political discourse since the 16th century, he said. Much of the conservative base rests in the rural parts of Holland, though Wilders claims he is gaining support in cities where crime rates are rising.
What can be done? Left-wing parties need to collaborate to put together a program that encourages multiculturalism, something most European governments are lacking, Holmes said. Policies focusing on better integrating new immigrants into schools and the Dutch economy are also necessary, and may likely have to be coupled with more aggressive stances on crime in order to be political viable. Striking the right balance will be a challenge, but a necessary one. Above all, progressive and anti-racist groups who might be tempted to dismiss Wilders as a marginal extremist would be wise to actively engage, oppose, and impede the PVV agenda.
If these political groups don't act, Wilders and his party will be poised to introduce policies in Holland that shouldn't be acceptable in 21st century Europe. "These problems are not going to get smaller," Shah said. "In 15 to 25 years, people like that are going to have more of a voice."
Ari Paul writes frequently about politics and religion. His articles have appeared in In These Times, Z Magazine, and OpenDemocracy.net.
