Government says Dutch identity is respect for laws

Residents of the Netherlands do not have to conduct themselves as ‘Dutch’ as long as they endorse the core values of the Dutch constitutional state. This is the nub of an official comment given by the cabinet on the report “Identification with the Netherlands” by the Scientific Council for Government Policy (WRR).

“The core values of the Netherlands constitutional state are the basis for identification with the Netherlands,” Justice Minister Ernst Hirsch Ballin and Integration Minister Ella Vogelaar say in a letter to parliament. “The government should work for a society that (…) encourages participation. It is however the responsibility of every citizen to actually participate and show themselves to be involved in the Netherlands society.”

The cabinet wants an “identity that excludes no people and that leaves room for people to be able to identify with the Netherlands in their own specific way.” The government “cannot and will not prescribe what Dutch nationality means for people and in what way people identify with the Netherlands.”

Among the tasks of the government, the cabinet includes “the fostering of freedom, respect and tolerance” while “a second task lies in the area of binding via citizenship.” Integration policy is part of this, but the white Dutch should also adapt, the cabinet suggests. “Active participation in Dutch society is a task for all citizens.”

Last year, a big commotion arose when Princess Maxima said at the presentation of the WRR report that the Dutch identity does not exist. It stung many people that this remark came from the wife of the future King, who is herself Argentinean.

Source: NIS News, 21 August 2008