We met with Rob Nijhoff who works with the Scientific Institute of the Christian Union Party in Parliament. He has a degree in Information Sciences from Delft Technical University as well as a degree from the Theological University of the Reformed Churches. He explained that each party has a scientific institute to conduct research and provide information to influence policy decisions. This is similar to the role which we observed that Michelle Chin plays as a policy advisor to Senator Cornyn in Texas.
There are many political parties here, which makes decision-making more difficult. There is even an animal rights party. While we visited, the animal rights party was objecting to the ritual slaughter of animals in the Jewish tradition because it is done without anesthesia. This includes any type of "kosher" preparation of meat, which of course is legal in the United States. The Christian Union party supports the free exercise of religion, so in this case was opposing the animal rights party on this issue.
He explained that currently, out of 150 members of Parliament, there are 30 social democrats, 30 liberals, 20 Christian democrats (more liberal than the Christian Union party), 30+30 more on the right and left, and 5 in the Christian Union party. The party identity is NOT to be a lobby for "Christian goals" but to stand on biblical principals, such as family values, right to life, etc. etc. etc. (They say "etc." three times in a row a lot here!) Abraham Kuyper was a "founding father" of this party, having served as a vicar and professor, he looked to the US as an example, and called it the "anti-revolutionary party" referring to the French revolution.
The primary philosophical bent which Rob shared with us was that no one is truly neutral in their view. The government is not neutral. All governments have a worldview, and every budget is a moral document. The example he gave was the decision to exclude prayer from American schools. He said this was a religious decision. He elaborated in the notes which he gave us (but didn't have time to share verbally, as we ran out of time) that everything reflects the identity of a school: the people, the emphasis in different subjects, the methods/rules, and even the atmosphere, including furnishing, architecture and environment. This is an interesting point, reflecting on what we learned at the Bernard Lievegoed (Waldorf-type) school. The teacher there said that a "free school" should be out in the country, built of wood, with lots of open spaces in the architecture, rather than the traditional institutional look and feel of an American high school, which is how the BL school was built.
In conclusion, Rob noted that it takes a coalition of minorities (it takes at least 3 parties to equal 52%) to make decisions in the Netherlands.
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