Netherlands (4) -- Analyses-- January-March 2006

Different opinions

8.03.2006

While the Dutch capital of Amsterdam tries to "keep it together", Rotterdam favours the "my way or the highway" approach to security and ethnic tensions ahead of local polls Tuesday. The vote will set the political mood in the lead-up to next year's general elections and national parties will be looking closely at which of the rival cities' approaches scores better at the ballot box. Feelings of insecurity and tensions between the native Dutch and immigrant communities, sharpened by a sense that the integration of Muslims has failed, have been on the rise in the Netherlands' two major cities. Rotterdam, traditionally a Labour stronghold, has been ruled since 2002 by the rightwing populist Leefbaar Rotterdam (Liveable Rotterdam), and the city makes headlines almost daily with radical plans for integration and security. The party has introduced preventative body searches in certain zones and a zero-tolerance crackdown on many minor offences. Most controversial was a measure requiring people who want to move from outside the city into underprivileged areas of Rotterdam to have a job. As for integration and unemployment, Leefbaar Rotterdam's message is clear: if you want to get a job or integrate into Dutch society we'll help you, if not we'll come down hard on you. "After years of immigration without rules we are now telling people: 'Get off of social security, get a job and by the way we think your children should have the right to decide for themselves who they want to marry'," Leefbaar Rotterdam leader Marco Pastors told AFP. "It sounds tough but we are not asking much. We just ask them to give people the individual freedom to believe what they want." Amsterdam, another traditional labour stronghold, was untouched by the populist revolution in Dutch politics in 2002. Here the PvdA labour party is following the traditional Dutch style of dialogue and consensus. Mayor Job Cohen persisted in this approach even after the brutal murder of outspoken filmmaker Theo van Gogh by a radical Muslim on the streets of Amsterdam in 2004. "For the last four years there is a confrontation between the Amsterdam model and that of Rotterdam. I think that after the elections we will see the coming together of the two styles," analyst Paul Scheffer told AFP.

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