Digging New Western European Trenches: Populism and the Foreign Policies of Germany and the Netherlands

Abstract

Germany and the Netherlands have traditionally been supportive of European integration. As original signatories to the Treaty of Rome, both countries claim to have always been a strong pillar of the European project. In the relance européenne of the mid-1980s both countries did not shy away from proposing supranational solutions to the main challenge that was perceived at the time: fear of losing economic competition to the US and the emerging economies in Asia. Indeed, in September 1991 the Netherlands, holding the rotating chair, famously proposed a treaty revision that was considered far too supranational—by France in particular—and then succeeded in securing a lighter version, the Treaty of Maastricht in December of that year. The realization of the single market and the establishment of the Eurozone proved vital in protecting the European Union (EU) from the effects of globalization, but these successes at the same time promoted the conditions for anti-European sentiments among various segments of the population, paving the ways for populist parties from the right as well as from the left.