Dutch Austerity 2.0 | 48 comments (48 topical, 0 editorial, 0 hidden)

Re: Dutch Austerity 2.0 (none / 0)

As far as I understand there will still be an election on September, 12th. And what do you mean the three bigger left parties? PdA, the socialists and who is the third?

I assume neither D66 nor the "greens" (what greens surely not groenleft?) can be plausibly a part of a left coalition now after voting for the budget.

Failure of austerity: Isn't between now and the elections a bit short time period to get any results if austerity works? They will discuss July numbers in early September.

by IM on Fri Apr 27th, 2012 at 04:28:57 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Dutch Austerity 2.0 (none / 1)

I assume neither D66 nor the "greens" (what greens surely not groenleft?) can be plausibly a part of a left coalition now after voting for the budget.

In this kind of crisis, it is the Social liberal corner that suffers the most from the contradiction between its principles and reality.

guaranteed to evoke a violent reaction from police is to challenge their right to "define the situation." --- David Graeber citing Marc Cooper

by Migeru (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Fri Apr 27th, 2012 at 04:36:10 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Dutch Austerity 2.0 (none / 0)

But yes, GroenLinks:

DutchNews.nl - Crisis averted? Five-party coalition agrees austerity package

Finance minister Jan Kees de Jager has succeeded in making a deal to cut the deficit together with the D66 Liberal democrats, green party GroenLinks and small Christian party ChristenUnie.

I'm really curious about their justification.

_{*Lunatic*, n.

One whose delusions are out of fashion.}

by DoDo on Fri Apr 27th, 2012 at 04:38:00 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Dutch Austerity 2.0 (none / 0)

"for the good of the country we have to be responsible"

guaranteed to evoke a violent reaction from police is to challenge their right to "define the situation." --- David Graeber citing Marc Cooper

by Migeru (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Fri Apr 27th, 2012 at 04:40:58 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Dutch Austerity 2.0 (4.00 / 2)

No, they voted for it after winning significant concessions, as told in the press release: crisis tax on the wealthy, crisis support for those on minimum wage, annulment of cuts in education, culture, public transport, elimination of coal and gas subsidies, support for solar power. But I find nothing on how they explain choosing to extract these concessions from the outgoing Rutte government rather than its successor elected in the next elections, or on how propping up Rutte will influence Rutte's chances in the next election.

_{*Lunatic*, n.

One whose delusions are out of fashion.}

by DoDo on Fri Apr 27th, 2012 at 05:13:53 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Dutch Austerity 2.0 (none / 0)

Yes groenlinks. But I always thought that they were more leftwing then your usual european green party. My political knowledge of the Netherlands seems to be out of date.

Perhaps they imitate switzerlands were one of the green parties call themselves grünliberale, that is green-liberal. Seems a more fitting name nowadays.

by IM on Fri Apr 27th, 2012 at 04:52:07 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Dutch Austerity 2.0 (none / 0)

At the European level only the Nordic Green Left caucuses with the "European United Left". The rest of the Green Parties are with the European Free Alliance (of non-ALDE liberals and regionalists).

That has to be telling us something...

guaranteed to evoke a violent reaction from police is to challenge their right to "define the situation." --- David Graeber citing Marc Cooper

by Migeru (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Fri Apr 27th, 2012 at 04:55:05 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Dutch Austerity 2.0 (none / 0)

I always had the impression that groenLinks - because of the "Links" and after all the communist party of the Netherlands was one founding elements - was to the left of say the German greens or the French greens.

But I should leave my early nineties impressions behind. Time and tide wait for no man and not for political parties either, t seems.

And the name is The Greens - European Free Alliance so I am not that surprised it is the first choice for green parties.

by IM on Fri Apr 27th, 2012 at 05:09:18 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Dutch Austerity 2.0 (none / 0)

the name is The Greens - European Free Alliance so I am not that surprised it is the first choice for green parties

No, the question is why The European Green Party_ decide to form a European Parliament Group with the EFA instead of other forces, or to group by themselves.

The EFA, after all,

>generally limited its membership to progressive parties, and therefore, not all European regionalist parties are members of EFA."

Also, the alliance of the European Green Party with the European Left Regionalists explains this spat.

guaranteed to evoke a violent reaction from police is to challenge their right to "define the situation." --- David Graeber citing Marc Cooper

by Migeru (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Fri Apr 27th, 2012 at 05:17:10 AM EST
[ Parent ]

You've answered your own question (4.00 / 2)

Communist parties, despite their theoretical adherence to internationalism, generally seem to turn out to be nationalist, anti-regionalist and anti-federalist in European terms.

Greens, on the other hand, are in favour of both localizing and internationalizing decision-making, and in general, tend to regard the nation-state as the most counter-productive decision-making level.

And I would put it the other way round with respect to the spat.

_{It is rightly acknowledged that people of faith have no monopoly of virtue
- Queen Elizabeth II}

by eurogreen on Fri Apr 27th, 2012 at 05:49:50 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: You've answered your own question (4.00 / 3)

I think the spat has nothing to with the party groups in the european parliament, who are all a bit unusual on the fringes. The question identity as citizen - identity as member of a cultural group - language as technological and administrative tool versus language as part of heritage and identity are much deeper.

And It can be argued that the still centralising french left is the outsider here.

And is doubtful if dwindling languages can be revived: Just look at Irish. On the other hand look at welsh.
Our communists were quite supportive to the sorabians by the way: Didn't help them much, though

And no I don't think the current position of GroenLinks on the budget has a connection to their position on frisian. (Whatever that position is)

by IM on Fri Apr 27th, 2012 at 06:12:18 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: You've answered your own question (none / 1)

I think the spat has nothing to with the party groups in the european parliament

No, I think it illustrates quite nicely why european greens feel more comfortable caucusing with progressive regionalists than with communists. I hope you are right about the French left being the outlier with respect to the centralizing state, in which case there may be hope for future co-operation, insofar as they are, belatedly, greening their views.

_{It is rightly acknowledged that people of faith have no monopoly of virtue
- Queen Elizabeth II}

by eurogreen on Fri Apr 27th, 2012 at 07:11:31 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: You've answered your own question (4.00 / 3)

The problem with regionalism and European federalism is that in contemporary political reality that means deregulation and privatisation, because in contemporary European political reality, the only entity powerful enough to police business is the state.

Devolving power to the regions and ceding it to the EU is to place the cart before the horse: Those institutions need to actually be useful before they can be entrusted with additional power.

tl;dr: Bring the ECB decisively to heel and we can talk about a federal Europe.

- Jake

Friends come and go. Enemies accumulate.

by JakeS (JangoSierra 'at' gmail 'dot' com) on Sat Apr 28th, 2012 at 05:52:07 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Dutch Austerity 2.0 (none / 0)

Well. The "Nordic Green Left" group only includes two parties which have "green" in their title : the icelandic "Left-Green movement", and the Danish "Red-Green Alliance". Between them they have one MEP. I don't know enough about the other member parties to say whether the group's title is a case of greenwashing or not, but the member parties all seem to be of communist origin.

The European Green Party forms a group (47 of the total 58) with regionalists of progressive stripe (with an embarassing Flemish exception), and various colourful independents. I'm not able to identify the "non-ALDE liberals", who did you have in mind?

_{It is rightly acknowledged that people of faith have no monopoly of virtue
- Queen Elizabeth II}

by eurogreen on Fri Apr 27th, 2012 at 05:41:39 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Dutch Austerity 2.0 (none / 1)

The "non-ALDE liberals" was a brainfart on my part. It's actually the "non-progressive regionalists" that end up in ALDE.

Regionalist parties appeal to the social-liberal streak in their political allies, be it the European Greens or the ELDR. As IM points out, the traditional Communist left tended to be statist and illiberal (seeing both individualism and regionalism as bourgeois or reactionnary). Right at the core of the spat, if you ask me.

guaranteed to evoke a violent reaction from police is to challenge their right to "define the situation." --- David Graeber citing Marc Cooper

by Migeru (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Fri Apr 27th, 2012 at 07:12:10 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Dutch Austerity 2.0 | 48 comments (48 topical, 0 editorial, 0 hidden)

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