Volkspartij voor Vrijheid en Democratie

Volkspartij voor Vrijheid en Democratie
Party leader	Mark Rutte
Party leader	Christianne van der Wal
Group Chairman, Second Chamber	Klaas Dijkhoff
Chairman of the First Chamber	Annemarie Jorritsma
EP Head of Delegation	Hans van Baalen
founding	January 24, 1948
Alignment	Conservative liberalism , economic liberalism , national liberalism
Colours)	Blue , orange
Sit in the First Chamber	12/75
Sit in the second chamber	32/150
Seats in the European Parliament	5/29
Number of members	25,557
International connections	Liberal International
European party	ALDE
EP Group	RE
www.vvd.nl

The Volkspartij voor Vrijheid en Democratie (VVD; pronounced [vɔlkspɑrtɛi vor vrɛihɛit ɛn demokra (t) si] or [vevedeː] ), German  People's Party for Freedom and Democracy , is a conservative - liberal party in the Netherlands . It represents a market-liberal economic policy and a nationally liberal to conservative domestic policy .

Since the election on October 14, 2010 , the VVD has been the strongest party in the Second Chamber and is the prime minister for the first time in Mark Rutte . She was previously involved in numerous government coalitions .

history

VVD was founded on January 24, 1948. She is the successor to the two liberal parties Liberale Staatspartij (LSP) and Partij van de Vrijheid (PvdV) . Then there was the more left-liberal group of Pieter Oud , which had initially joined the Partij van de Arbeid .

From 1948 the VVD ruled in various governments. In the years 1952–1958, 1965–1967, 1973–1977, 1981/1982, 1989–1994 and 2007–2010 she was in the opposition, where she was often the largest and most important opposition party. In 1966 the left-wing liberal party Democrats 66 was founded , which took over part of the liberal spectrum as a whole.

The current political leader is Mark Rutte, who was just elected in 2006 compared to right-wing competitor Rita Verdonk . At that time, Rutte also headed the parliamentary group in the Second Chamber. The election on June 9, 2010 resulted in 31 seats for the VVD, one more seat than for the party with the second largest number of seats, the social democratic PvdA . This was not the highest figure ever achieved by the VVD, but for the first time the VVD became the strongest party, mainly because of the losses of the Christian Democrats ( CDA ). In the parliamentary elections in September 2012 , the VVD was able to win ten seats and achieve its best result to date with a share of the vote of 26.8 percent.

government

Mark Rutte on election night 2010 in Scheveningen

The VVD had been represented in the Dutch government since 1994 until a new government made up of Christian Democrats, Social Democrats and the Christian Union was formed in 2007. In 2010, Mark Rutte was the first VVD party leader to be appointed Prime Minister. He led a minority government consisting of VVD and CDA ( Cabinet Rutte I ). Until April 2012, this liberal-Christian coalition was supported by the right-wing populist Partij voor de Vrijheid (PVV). The VVD emerged stronger from the early elections on September 12, 2012, and Mark Rutte was again Prime Minister ( Rutte II cabinet ), supported by a grand coalition of VVD and PvdA during this period. The Rutte III cabinet has been in power since October 26, 2017 , supported by a coalition of VVD, CDA, Democrats 66 and ChristenUnie .

Alignment

The Volkspartij voor Vrijheid en Democratie represents a classic liberalism that emphasizes the responsibility of the individual and is critical of the expansion of the welfare state . One of the demands of the VVD is a restriction on immigration. There is a more centristically oriented wing and a national liberal wing; thus the economic liberal party covers the electoral spectrum from the center-right to near the right edge. Immediately to the right of the VVD is the rival PVV party founded by Geert Wilders , which is also represented in parliament.

organization

Party headquarters in The Hague

The VVD began in 1948 with 22,175 members. By 1978 it was able to improve to 100,510 members, with the increase coming mainly from the time of the Social Democratic Prime Minister Joop den Uyl (1973–1977). After a decline around 1980, the number of members rose to 102,888 in the record year 1982. Since then, the number has been falling relatively continuously. At the beginning of the purple cabinet in 1994, the VVD still had 53,465 members, at the beginning of 2019 it had only 25,557. This is in line with a general trend among large parties.

The youth organization Jongeren Organizatie voor Vrijheid en Democratie (JOVD) is closely associated with the VVD. However, it operates independently of the party and is open to all young liberals.

There is also a scientific institute named after Benjamin Marius Telders , Prof. mr. BM Teldersstichting , the training center Haya van Somerenstichting , the VVD Bestuurdersvereniging (entrepreneurs) and the Liberaal Vrouwen Netwerk (LVN) (women's network).

The four VVD MEPs in the European Parliament belong to the Renew Europe group, which will be the third largest group in the 2019–2024 legislative period .

Known members

In the European Commission , the Dutch Commissioner for Digital Agenda , Neelie Kroes , belongs to the VVD. The former commissioner for the internal market Frits Bolkestein is also a member of the VVD. Bolkestein, who is clearly to the right, is not only a strong leader and a minister, but also an important theoretician of liberalism.

The Islam critic Ayaan Hirsi Ali was a member of the Second Chamber of the Dutch Parliament for the VVD until May 15, 2006. Former VVD members Geert Wilders and Rita Verdonk founded their own right-wing populist parties, the PVV and Trots op Nederland, respectively .

Election results

• 1948: 7.9% - 8 seats
• 1952: 8.8% - 9 seats
• 1956: 8.8% - 9 seats (after enlargement of parliament: 13)
• 1959: 12.2% - 19 seats
• 1963: 10.3% - 16 seats
• 1967: 10.7% - 17 seats
• 1971: 10.3% - 16 seats
• 1972: 14.4% - 22 seats
• 1977: 17.9% - 28 seats
• 1981: 17.3% - 26 seats
• 1982: 23.1% - 36 seats
• 1986: 17.4% - 27 seats
• 1989: 14.6% - 22 seats
• 1994: 20.0% - 31 seats
• 1998: 24.7% - 38 seats
• 2002: 15.4% - 24 seats
• 2003: 17.9% - 28 seats
• 2006 : 14.7% - 22 seats
• 2010 : 20.5% - 31 seats
• 2012 : 26.8% - 41 seats
• 2017 : 21.3% - 33 seats

Web links

Commons : Volkspartij voor Vrijheid en Democratie  - Collection of pictures, videos and audio files

• Official website of the Volkspartij voor Vrijheid en Democratie

Individual evidence

1. ↑ ^{a b} VVD ledentallen per jaar (1948-). In: Documentatiecentrum Nederlandse Politieke Partijen. University of Groningen , February 12, 2019, accessed on February 23, 2019 (Dutch). 
2. ↑ Rudy Andeweg , Galen A. Irwin: Politics and Governance in the Netherlands . Palgrave Macmillan, Basingstoke, 2nd ed. 2002, ISBN 0-333-96156-0 , p. 49.
3. ↑ Rudy W. Andeweg, Lieven De Winter, Patrick Dumont: Government formation . Taylor & Francis, 2011, ISBN 978-1-134-23972-6 , pp. 147 ( books.google.com ).
4. ^ Jochen Clasen, Daniel Clegg: Regulating the Risk of Unemployment: National Adaptations to Post-Industrial Labor Markets in Europe . Oxford University Press, 2011, ISBN 978-0-19-959229-6 , pp. 76 ( books.google.com ).
5. ^ David Broughton: Changing Party Systems in Western Europe . Continuum International Publishing Group, 1999, ISBN 978-1-85567-328-1 , pp. 178 ( books.google.com ).
6. ^ Thomas Poguntke, Paul Webb: The Presidentialization of Politics: A Comparative Study of Modern Democracies . Oxford University Press, 2007, ISBN 978-0-19-921849-3 , pp. 158 ( books.google.com ).
7. ^ Anne Marije van Essen, Paul Pennings: Balancing Competing Goals. Exploring the political controversy on new hospital payment systems in Germany, the Netherlands and the UK. In: Journal for Comparative Political Science . Volume 3, No. 1, 2009, p. 71.
8. ↑ Thomas Gerlinger, Renate Reiter: Small country studies of the Netherlands. bpb , September 22, 2014, accessed December 2, 2015 .