TSEG - The Low Countries Journal of Social and Economic History

Not so Consensual after All.

2021-06-22T13:55:26+02:00

Sound Toll Registers Online.

2021-06-22T15:01:28+02:00

In 2020, the University of Groningen and Tresoar, the Frisian Historical and Literary Center in Leeuwarden, completed the online database providing instant and free access to the complete Sound Toll Registers. This database, Sound Toll Registers Online (STRO), is already available to everyone at www.soundtoll.nl. Huygens ING is now taking over STRO from Tresoar and the University of Groningen to ensure its quality, accessibility and continuity.

Bureaucrats First.

2021-06-22T14:08:07+02:00

In the 1980s, a fundamental shift took place in Dutch economic policy: Keynesian demand-management was exchanged for a neoliberal supply-side approach. The single most influential account of this transformation has focused on consensus among corporatist policymakers as key to the reforms. It is the origin story of the Dutch ‘polder model’. The problem however, is that there is surprisingly little evidence for corporatist consensus in the 1980s. Instead of consensus, we argue that there has been a conflict of ideas between Keynesians and supply-siders. And instead of corporatism, we point to bureaucratic elites as a crucial factor in the Dutch policy shift. From the mid-1970s onwards, an influential group of senior public officials emerged that successfully advocated for a supply-side policy, inspired by the industrialization policies developed in the 1950s. In so doing, we believe the Dutch case exemplifies the pathbreaking role of administrative elites as highlighted by Skocpol, Weir and Heclo, rather than corporatist consensus.

Towards a Politics of Restraint.

2021-06-22T14:20:29+02:00

Public choice theory, an analysis of politics based on economic principles, is often considered to be one of the major innovations in economics and political sciences in the second half of the twentieth century. In its formulation by James Buchanan and Gordon Tullock, public choice is commonly understood as one of the major theoretical building blocks in the development of neoliberal thought. It was also remarkably popular with economists and political scientists within the Dutch Labour Party (Partij van de Arbeid) in the mid-1970s. This latter fact is surprising since public choice was seemingly at odds with the Keynesian ideas around which the Labour Party had built its economic policy. This article investigates why and how public choice became popular in the Labour Party. In understanding the popularity of this theory, I will argue, it is important to see the popularity of neoliberal ideas not only in reaction to the economic tribulation of the period but also as a discussion on social planning and an expression of discontent with the democratization movement. Since the rise of neoliberalism in Dutch policymaking is often understood as coming from liberal and conservative channels, studying public choice within the Labour party will shed new light on the development of neoliberalism in the Netherlands.

De Europese Commissie als motor van verandering.

2021-06-22T14:27:37+02:00

By analyzing the case of the closure of the Amsterdam shipyards in the 1980s, this article shows how the European Commission actively promoted a neoliberal turn in policies towards state support for economic sectors in Western-Europe. Besides the EC, the article also makes clear that quite early on leading civil servants within the Dutch ministries of Economic Affairs and of Finance embraced neoliberal ideas as an answer to tackle the economic crisis of the 1970s. A third, often neglected actor in explanations on the rise of neoliberalism were management consultants – in this case from management consultancy firm McKinsey – who wrote alarming reports about the shipbuilding industry and promoted ideas that emphasized the importance of business principles and individual managers as key for improvement, thereby offering an alternative to macroeconomic Keynesian models of growth.

Flexland in wording.

2021-06-22T14:47:05+02:00

Internationally, the 1980s marked a shift in economic policy. In the Netherlands, it was the decade of the supposedly moderate neoliberal turn and of the first round of flexibilization. Nowadays, the degree of flexibility of the Dutch labour market is exceptionally high compared to neighbouring countries. This article examines how the trade union movement in the 1980s responded to increasing flexibilization, which strategy was used, and how this contributed to early Dutch flexibilization. In contrast to the literature with an institutional perspective, this article analyzes the trade union movement from a social-historical perspective and as a social movement organization. As a result, it argues that the effects of rising flexibilization were signalled very early on within the trade unions. Be that as it may, both the priorities that followed from the agreements with employer organizations and the internal dynamics, were decisive for the trade union movement’s relatively late and unassertive responses towards the flexibilization of labour in the 1980s.

Rudolf A.A. Bosch, Stedelijke macht tussen overvloed en stagnatie. Stadsfinanciën, sociaal-politieke structuren en economie in het hertogdom Gelre, ca. 1350-1550

2021-06-23T10:35:31+02:00

Jessica Dijkman and Bas van Leeuwen (eds.), An Economic History of Famine Resilience

2021-06-23T10:39:41+02:00

Jan Luiten van Zanden, Tine de Moor and Sarah Carmichael, Capital Women. The European Marriage Pattern, Female Empowerment and Economic Development in Western Europe 1300-1800

2021-06-23T10:44:42+02:00

Marianne Eekhout, Memorabilia van de Tachtigjarige Oorlog

2021-06-23T10:51:32+02:00

Hittjo Kruyswijk, Gek, niet ziek? Lucas Lindeboom, Abraham Kuyper en de stichting van gereformeerde ziekenhuizen in Nederland (1880-1940)

2021-06-23T10:56:27+02:00

Maarten Hell, De Amsterdamse herberg 1450-1800. Geestrijk centrum van het openbare leven

2021-06-23T10:59:46+02:00

Sharika D. Crawford, The Last Turtlemen of the Caribbean. Waterscapes of Labor, Conservation, and Boundary Maki

2021-06-23T11:07:11+02:00

Lodewijk Petram en Samuël Kruizinga, De oorlog tegemoet. Nederlanders en de strijd om Spanje, 1936-1939

2021-06-23T11:10:37+02:00

David Onnekink and Gijs Rommelse, The Dutch in the Early Modern World. A History of a Global Power

2021-06-23T11:14:21+02:00

Ewout Frankema and Anne Booth (eds.), Fiscal Capacity and the Colonial State in Asia and Africa, c. 1850-1960

2021-06-23T11:19:23+02:00

Thomas Max Safley, Family Firms and Merchant Capitalism in Early Modern Europe. The Business, Bankruptcy and Resilience of the Höchstetters of Augsburg

2021-06-23T11:22:52+02:00