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| Geert Wilders: "a lot of talk and spin, rather than substance" |
If the European dream is to die, it may be the Netherlands that delivers the fatal blow. The Dutch general election in March is shaping up to be a defining moment for the European project
The
risk to the European Union doesn’t come from Geert Wilders, the leader
of anti-EU, anti-immigration Party for Freedom. He is well ahead in the
polls and looks destined to benefit from many of the social and economic
factors that paved the way for the Brexit and Trump revolts.
But
the vagaries of the Dutch political system make it highly unlikely that
Mr. Wilders will find his way into government. As things stand, he is
predicted to win just 29 out of the 150 seats in the new parliament, and
mainstream parties seem certain to shun him as a coalition partner. In
an increasingly fragmented Dutch political landscape, most observers
agree that the likely outcome of the election is a coalition of four or
five center-right and center-left parties.
Instead,
the risk to the EU comes from a new generation of Dutch euroskeptics who
are less divisive and concerned about immigration but more focused on
questions of sovereignty—and utterly committed to the destruction of the
EU. Its leading figures are Thierry Baudet and Jan Roos, who have close
links to British euroskeptics. They have already scored one significant
success: In 2015, they persuaded the Dutch parliament to adopt a law
that requires the government to hold a referendum on any law if 300,000
cIfitizens request it. They then took advantage of this law at the first
opportunity to secure a vote that rejected the EU’s proposed trade and
economic pact with Ukraine, which Brussels saw as a vital step in
supporting a strategically important neighbor.
This
referendum law is a potential bomb under the EU, as both Dutch
politicians and Brussels officials are well aware. Mr. Baudet believes
he now has the means to block any steps the EU might seek to take to
deepen European integration or stabilize the eurozone if they require
Dutch legislation. This could potentially include aid to troubled
Southern European countries such as Greece and Italy, rendering the
eurozone unworkable.
Indeed, the Dutch government gave a
further boost to Mr. Baudet and his allies when it agreed to accept the
outcome of the Ukraine referendum if turnout was above 30%, even though
it was under no legal obligation to do so. This was a major concession
to the euroskeptics, as became clear when strong turnout among their
highly motivated supporters lifted overall turnout to 31%. With Mr.
Wilders’s party, currently polling above 25%, and both Mr. Baudet and
Mr. Roos having launched their own parties, Dutch euroskeptics are
confident they will be able to reach the 30% threshold in future
referendums.
From the rest of the EU’s perspective, the
central question of the election is whether mainstream Dutch parties
can find a way to defuse this bomb. That won’t be easy.
The
first challenge is to find a way out of the Ukraine impasse. Prime
Minister Mark Rutte remains committed to ratifying the deal but he needs
to do so in a way that won’t expose him to charges of ignoring the
referendum result, thereby stoking euroskeptic support. Dutch, EU and
Ukrainian negotiators will sit down next week and try to hammer out a
legally binding clarification that makes clear that the agreement
doesn’t include military assistance and doesn’t offer a path to
Ukraine’s EU membership.
But even if the rest of the EU
and Ukraine can reach such a compromise, Mr. Rutte may not be able to
secure the backing of the Dutch Senate, where he lacks a majority.
Opposition parties don’t want to be seen to be participating in what
will inevitably be portrayed as an establishment stitch-up so close to
elections.
The second step to defusing the bomb is to
amend the referendum law to exclude international agreements. But while
pro-European politicians privately say this is their goal, few are
willing to say so publicly. Parties on the center-right don’t want to
antagonize their increasingly euroskeptic voter base, while much of the
center-left is hamstrung by its past support for the referendum law,
which they backed because of a long-standing enthusiasm for direct
democracy.
Instead, some mainstream politicians are
privately pinning their hopes on the Christian Democrats, a center-right
party currently in opposition and traditionally suspicious of direct
democracy, riding to the rescue by insisting on an amendment to the law
as a condition of any future coalition agreement. Yet the Christian
Democrats don’t appear in any mood to let other parties off the hook so
easily: The party is currently leading the parliamentary opposition to
the government’s efforts to ratify the Ukraine deal.
Not
surprisingly, the mood in Brussels, where this situation is being
watched closely, is gloomy. One top official reckons the chances of the
Dutch government defusing this bomb at less than 50%. Those may turn out
to be the odds on the ultimate survival of the European project.
Read more: The EU’s New Bomb Is Ticking in the Netherlands - WSJ
