Strange Neighbors: about politics in the Netherlands and Belgium

Few countries are so culturally closely related and yet so politically different as the Netherlands and Belgium. We read each other's literature, buy each other's goods and watch each other's television programmes, but in political terms we are as different as night and day. In the House of Representatives, the debate is ordered with the chairman as a strict schoolmaster: not a single unkind word is uttered, while in the Belgian House people shout and rant like crazy. The Dutch and Belgians also deal with the past differently, especially when it concerns the Second World War or the former colonies of Indonesia and Congo. The Hague proclaims its 'ministerial right' in Europe, while in Brussels much more is arranged through 'monastery intrigues', and the Netherlands is the central civil servant state where policy is key, while in the Belgian participation appointments are the linchpin of the system.