This is a huge improvement since 2003, when they only held nine. The Christian Democrats may not be able to find coalition partners.

It is possible for Labour to form a majority coalition with the Socialists, the Greens, two smaller "social liberal" parties, and even a moderate Christian party. Who knows what this will mean for a Dutch troop withdrawal from Iraq.

Read more here.

[ 22 November 2006: Message edited by: Sean Cain ]

Unfortunately, the only statement I found they had on democratizing the economy was:

quote:

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Half of the commissioners in enterprises partnership appointed by the workers

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Their other policies were greater and more efficient social programs as well as regulations against monopolies.

[ 22 November 2006: Message edited by: Tom Vouloumanos ]

A centre-left coalition could conceivably eke out a razor thin majority with the support of the Animal Rights Party.

Of the 4 main parties, the most left-wing (Socialists) and right-wing (Liberals) disagree on everything but are both Euro-skeptic (for opposing reasons).

There's a lot of bad blood w/i the left as the Socialists are gaining mostly at the expense of both Labour and the Green Left, according to a Dutch cousin who is an activist in the latter.

So I will close by agreeing with Stockholm that a grand coalition of the Christian Democrats, Labour and several smaller centre parties seems like the logical outcome.

[ 22 November 2006: Message edited by: John K ]

quote:

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Stockholm, you forgot the Christian Union (won seven seats) which - don't get fooled by its name - has historically been part of the Centre Left coalition.
A centre-left coalition could conceivably eke out a razor thin majority with the support of the Animal Rights Party.

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quote:

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Well, good for them. I wouldn't vote for a Maoist party, nor a Marxist-Leninist party. It seems they've gotten past that particular ideological cul-de-sac.

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Hear Here Heer! T’is time somebody BBQ'd the sacred (capitalistic) cow for some around here.

I just read through the Dutch Socialist Party link posted here. It seems like a well-intended and honourable platform, although it seems to come up short on ways of how to develop this democratic socialist sustainable economy they talk about (that's where I'm interested in seeing more debate).

However, it's definitely not Maoist or so-called "Marxist"-Leninist, and, as the Coyote says, good on them.

The centralist state capitalist monopoly economics of Lenin, supposedly intended to act as a gradual transition period from a predominantly capitalist to a predominantly socialist one, has been a total failure, as well as an ethical betrayal of both Marxism and historically the entire socialist movement.

The tragic legacies left by Mao, and especially Stalin, are proof of this. These two regimes, in particular the latter, set out to smash the very socialistic, labour and pro-democracy movements that they depended on for support in the first place, and, along with their appointed pre-revolution capitalists in charge of industry, set up such a vicious trickle-down economic and violent imperialistic foreign policy enough to make a neo-con drool.

Add to this, their dishonest twisting around of terms like socialism, Marxism and communism, divorcing them from their established historic meanings, gave opportunity to the extremist corporate capitalist fanatics in Germany, known as Nazis, to do the same.

It also gave the post-World War II Cold War tyrants in the US and UK to again twist these terms to associate them with the brutality of these state capitalist regimes, in order to try to discredit socialist economics at home and push their own Yankee-style corporate capitalism on the rest of the world.

I think it's long over-due that socialists, labour and co-op/economic democracy/sustainability activists, social justice and pro-democracy advocates and free thinkers dump whatever romanticisms we may have left for these totalitarian state capitalist economic policies and denounce them as what they are.

quote:

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Dutch voters, like Arno Heltzel, an aid agency worker, are used to this sort of thing.

"In Holland," he said, "you vote, your party goes through all sorts of negotiations, and ends up different from the one you voted for."

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quote:

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Originally posted by a lonely worker:
any total party breakdown and any word yet about what parties will be in the coaltion?

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quote:

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Theoretically Labour, the SP and all the various smaller leftist parties can form a 76 seat majority, since the parties of the Right hold only 33 seats and the centrist CDA holds 41. This, however, is unlikely to happen as it would require a coalition of no fewer than 6 parties. Moreover, Labour regards the SP as too far to the Left and too radical on other issues, such as European unification which the SP is very critical of. Hence a center-left coalition of CDA, Labour and the Christen Unie is the most likely successor to the current center-right coalition of CDA, Liberals and Liberal-Democrats. This will allow Balkenende to succeed himself as Prime Minister.

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Green Left 7

The PvdD, Party for Animals, animal rights activists, 2

The center-left Labour Party (PvdA) 32 (Amended: 33)

"Democrats 66" 3

The Christen Unie (CU), Calvinist and morally conservative but economically leftist, 6.

The centrist Christian-Democrats (CDA) of Prime Minister Jan-Peter Balkenende 41 seats

The center-right Liberal Party VVD 22

The “islamophobic” Freedom Party (PVV) of Geert Wilders 9

National Reformed Party (SGP), orthodox Christian, 2

All of the parties already represented in the parliament lost seats, except for the SP and ChristenUnie.

For a more social policy:

quote:

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Socialist SP leader Jan Marijnissen said it was his responsibility to discuss possible coalitions with the CDA and Labour PvdA . . . voters had clearly asked for a more social policy.

ChristenUnie leader Andre Rouvoet . . said the election result was a signal that voters wanted a more social policy.

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[ 03 December 2006: Message edited by: Wilf Day ]

Its sad that we have fallen so far behind that a return to those basic values is being portrayed by the media as something frightening.

I noticed in our media that this election is getting minimal coverage and the SP's "stunning" win (to use the word from your excellent source) isn't even mentioned.

Here's the Globe's take on it:

Dutch vote signals halt in restrictions on diversity

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The Dutch, who have gone further than any Europeans in restricting Muslim immigrants and enforcing cultural integration, have sent an electoral message: "Enough."

The vote seemed to signal a halt, though not a reversal, in the Netherlands's shift from unlimited tolerance to aggressive restrictions on diversity.

While Jan Peter Balkenende, the Christian Democrat Prime Minister who introduced the measures restricting diversity, declared victory last night and is likely to head a new governing coalition -- he did not win enough seats to govern without allies -- voters punished those who would go further.

Ms. Verdonk's party, the right-wing, anti-immigrant VVD, lost six seats, dropping to 22 in the 150-seat Parliament, according to early results. And left-wing parties, which are slightly more tolerant of immigrants but are mostly willing to support existing restrictions, saw strong gains.

So while yesterday's vote saw dramatic gains by the centre-left Labour Party and the left-wing Socialist Party, this is unlikely to have much impact on immigration policies, even if those parties are able to form a coalition.

While the Labour Party, now the second-largest party in Parliament after Mr. Balkenende's Christian Democrats, would grant an amnesty to thousands of refugee claimants, on the whole the left's policies on immigration are as tough and restrictive as the right's -- indicating a consensus in Dutch society.

"We feel that the situation has not changed for the better . . . all newcomers should be able to speak Dutch, and they don't now, and a lot of people are forced to live in neighbourhoods that have really turned dangerous as a result of immigration," said Lianne Rapp, an adviser to the leader of the Labour Party.

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Labour lost seats over comments like this. The SP virtually tripled their vote and in Canada we get fictional news stories like this.

I've always believed that the best way to see extreme media bias is to read the msm's articles involving socialism or the middle east.

[ 24 November 2006: Message edited by: a lonely worker ]

quote:

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Originally posted by Steppenwolf Allende:

The tragic legacies left by Mao, and especially Stalin, are proof of this.

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The truth is, China was a fourth world basket case in 1949, behind democratic capitalist India in every social and economic measure.

By 1970-76, China's infant mortality rates were better than ALL of the democratic capitalist third world countries, including India's, a country that has followed Washington-based consensus for free market austerity for many years now and still with the largest numbers of the world's chronically hungry people today.

Adult life expectancy in China was doubled by the time of Mao's death. These facts are verified by World Bank statistics.

quote:

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It also gave the post-World War II Cold War tyrants in the US and UK to again twist these terms to associate them with the brutality of these state capitalist regimes, in order to try to discredit socialist economics at home and push their own Yankee-style corporate capitalism on the rest of the world.

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State capitalism is what died in 1929 around the western world. I've lost track of how many times you've been updated on that fact. Laissez-faire capitalism was buried under a Wall Street gravemarker in the 1930's, R.I.P., after a 30 year-long experiment conducted in North America and Europe under optimal conditions free of the devastations of war and conflict. Laissez-faire was never really hands-off capitalism though. It was true state capitalism which favoured the rich while workers earned dollar a day wages on average. L-F capitalism has been described by people who lived in those times as "duller and greyer than Soviet communism."

The alternative is for Labour to join a centrist coalition amd watch even more of its voters bleed away to the Socialists, since those who left are said to have wanted to prevent that very thing: a Labour - conservative coalition.

So why not offer to do what the voters want? If the CDA wants to refuse, let them take the blame.

[ 24 November 2006: Message edited by: Wilf Day ]

quote:

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State capitalism is what died in 1929 around the western world. I've lost track of how many times you've been updated on that fact.

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No, Fidel, what you have lost track of is how many times you have hurled out baseless rhetoric, unfounded romanticism and goofy meaningless terms like “Soviet communism” or “democratic capitalism” in the face of the quoted facts, verified history, economic reports and documents from those leaders and governments that I post on these matters.

It’s at the point where I often don’t even read your posts anymore, let alone respond. Updates don’t help if they are not based on reality.

And, no, Fidel, state capitalism is very much alive and an integral part, in various ways to various degrees, of every industrial economy on the planet. Capitalist economics would not survive without it.

And, finally, Fidel, I never said there were no improvements in China as a result of some of the policies of the Maoist regime. I said there is a tragic legacy, as in when that regime and its self-admitted state capitalist economic policies turned against the same communistic agricultural commune movements that Mao so depended on during the 1949 revolution and force them under a top-down authoritarian corporatist framework and, in true capitalistic fashion, squeeze as much wealth out of them as possible, much like Stalin did in Russia and Ukraine in the 1930s, that ended up killing millions of people.

Infant mortality may have greatly improved. But as soon as some of those infants grew up and joined a commune, their chances of growing old dropped substantially.

The fact is that in the first part of the 20th century and to a lesser extent since then, terms like “socialism” and “communism” got twisted and divorced from their historic meanings by corporatists and fascistic con artists advancing their own capitalistic agendas and selling them to people as something they were not.

That means no democratic ownership and control of the commercial means of production. No sustainable economics based on meeting individual and community need as determined by each or long-term well-being of the community and its ecology as a whole. No social measure of how people improve themselves or how free they are. No linking the acquisition of individual property to the individual’s labour (as opposed to exploiting others to get it). No fostering of mutual liberty and equal rights to promote “the free development of each is the free development of all.”

quote:

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I guess our current succes comes from a number of factors. First of all there is the activism. Most of this takes place at the local municipal scale, and can be anything from preventing housing being tore down to saving a park or preventing asylum seekers being evicted. We usually focus on helping people organize themselves, so many of the local campaign organizations will not be entirely or even mostly made up of SP members (although as often as not, by the time it finishes, most people have joined the party).

A traditional example of how we work might be like this: we hold a poll under the population of a neighborhood about maybe the condition of there houses. If from this poll it appears that there is something wrong with them (and of course, since we choose our targets, usually there will be), like for example leaky roofs, then we will call a tenants meeting, if possible together with a local tenants organization. At the meeting we try to have them form a committee on the issue (and usually at least one party member will be on this), and they will organize actions, write letters, hold demonstrations etc., assisted if necessary by the party. The benefits of this is not just that we spread a lot of goodwill, but also that people discover that they need not be passive but can take their lives into own control, which makes it a lot easier to mobilize them next time (here you see some of our old Maoist doctrine still put into practice).

As for the helplines: most local SP-organisations will have a phone number and also at elast one evening in the week were people can come by for advice and help, for example with welfare or rent issues, tax forms, etc. These evenings are often quite succesfull and popular. The good thing is that we not only actively help people, but it also helps us to get a very good idea what the problems of the people are. If for example many people have difficulty with a specific part of a welfare form, then we know this is a problem and have a local one of our council members address this. This way we can have many small successen. This activism is really what has made the SP large. Since about a third of our +- 50.000 members is in some way active, we also have a much larger army of volunteers during election times. Of course, we usually also have several national campaigns going on, for example against the Iraq war and more expensive healthcare.

Apart from the activism, what also helps is that we are in the quite unique position of being a left-wing party but also being quite rich. Since all of our party councilors and parliamentarians donate what they receive as compensation from the government to the party, we have a huge form of income other parties do not have. Local politicians are considered activists just like any other in the party, only MP’s and MSP’s work full-time for the party and therefore receive a (workers) salary. With this money we can have very professional campaigns. Our last election campaign was considered by a majority of citizens the most effective of all parties, and we also occasionally win design prizes for our website and logo.

Finally, it helps that we have a party leader who is well known, well trusted and probably the best politican in the Netherlands at the moment.

As for our views on socialism, I guess you would consider us “reformists”. I guess you might call us leftwing social-democrats (although to Dutch media we are still the “extreme left”). We are neither Marxist or revolutionary (although we do have some within our organization). We are more anti-neoliberal, and protectors of the traditional welfare state. And eurosceptic of course.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Steppenwolf Allende:
Yer a real riot, Fidel:

No, Fidel, what you have lost track of is how many times you have hurled out baseless rhetoric, unfounded romanticism and goofy meaningless terms like “Soviet communism” or “democratic capitalism” in the face of the quoted facts,

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That's just it, you haven't nailed up any facts for us. We can encapsulate all of your rhetoric on this off-topic matter like this: STATE CAPITALISM!!!

quote:

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And, finally, Fidel, I never said there were no improvements in China as a result of some of the policies of the Maoist regime.

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Hundreds of millions were born in the rice paddies and died in those same rice paddies and farmers fields an average of 30 years later. Mortality figures are very important in developing countries - they are the first social measure looked at in determining failing or successful nation state. There are lots of free market shitholes that haven't equalled Mao's accomplishments wrt this important social measure. One of these free market utopias is still waiting for the capitalist economic long run to kick-in, India, a country of comparable population and which was ahead of China in several important economic and social measures in 1949. Singapore was another fourth world hell hole in 1965. And freely trading Burma still is a shithole, like Haiti, and Nicaragua after more than a decade of neo-Liberal economic reforms. But the U.S. doesn't preach to those countries anything close to what they themselves used in picking the U.S.A(and Nazi Germany) off its economic knees in the 1930's. What Washington does preach to those bass-ackwards countries is neo-Liberalism and "capitalism", which is why those countries are still mired in abject poverty and widespread misery.

Life was cheap in imperialist Russia, and in China where peasants were obliged to fall down prostrate in the presence of the emperor. Western-backed tyrants like Chiang Kai-Shek changed Chinese history forever as did western aggression against Russia with WWI, a 25 nation invasion of Russia to put down the revolution in 1922, and then again with western aggression against Russia part deux with WWII. Russians were tired of fighting endless battles on behalf of insane, in-bred blue bloods who waged war on their own cousins. The Russians pursued war communism out of necessity in order to put an end to the aggression, the homelessness and the misery caused by western attempts to keep them poor and subserviant. Russia was forced to industrialise and weaponize. What took the western world 300 years in moving from agrarian to industrial economy and with incalculable human suffering and misery was done in a matter of twenty years in Russia. History is sometimes a matter of necessity than design, S.A. History doesn't happen in a vacuum. And this is where we are today.

Your ignoring every socialist contribution to what we are at risk of losing today to political forces pressing for the return of real laissez-faire state capitalism is a disservice to every socialist, union worker and grassroots political activist who has ever fought the good fight in making life worth living in North America, and Europe where mixed economies and social democracy exist today. We don't have real capitalism today, and it's because the western world rejected it in the 1930's, S.A..

State capitalism has existed in two countries since WWII: Nazi Germany and the U.S.A. The U.S. doesn't preach state capitalism to the rest of the "democratic" capitalist third world as a prescription for what ails those countries. And it's for a reason. This isn't the proper thread, and you are way off topic as per usual with another one of your inane rants about "state capitalism." And you have only a little idea of what you're talking about anyway which makes it that much more indigestable. Give us a break!.

[ 24 November 2006: Message edited by: Fidel ]

quote:

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Originally posted by Doug:
State capitalism doesn't mean what you apparently think it does. It generally refers to the state owning the means of production and its associated class of politicians and bureaucrats extracting the surplus from them. The Soviet Union would be a historical example of this.

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I give up. No, the Soviet Union was not state capitalist in the same sense that Nazi Germany was and the U.S.A continues to be today. Contrary to popular opinion and Rand Corporation propaganda throughout the cold war, the Soviets did not allocate half of GNP to military production. A non-dollarized economy meant that the Soviet elite were comparatively well off only in the Soviet Union. The fortunes of the handful few multi-billionaires in the west dwarfed the life-styles and Russian bank accounts of the Soviets.

In the Soviet Union, bureaucrats were considered the owners and benefactors of the means of production. I think exclusive property laws were one of the largest differences between Soviet communism and state capitalism in the west.

Unemployment is a tool of state capitalists used in the coercion of workers to accept lower wages and low working conditions. Workers in the Soviet Union were guaranteed jobs, and bread on the table. Post-Secondary education and health care were free in the Soviet Union. Housing was free except for cost of utilities. The Soviet Union extended the offer of free education for the decolonization of Africa, which didn't happen because of cold war intervention by western countries practicing state capitalism at the time. In fact, free market education is policy in the poorest of poor African nations today, another glaring difference between Soviet and western neo-Liberal policies. And none of those basic rights existed with state capitalism, and it definitely wasnt true of laissez-faire capitalism.

That and the recognition of corporations with legal rights. State capitalism is Keynesian-militarism or "socialism for the rich" and blended with important social gains fought hard for by ordinary people in the west during a time of cold war influences emmanating from the Soviet Union and Maoist China.

And Laissez-faire capitalism was a 30 year experiment that died around the western world in 1929. Not even capitalists desire a return to dog-eat-dog laissez-faire capitalism. They prefer socialism for the rich.

[ 24 November 2006: Message edited by: Fidel ]

Something signifcant happens (the appearance of an anti-neoliberal, left of mainstream social democracy party as a major political force in a western european country), and within a few posts people on this thread are back to arguing about the 'hot issues' of 40-80 years ago.

Anyone have any comments on the Dutch SP, and what their success might (or might not) mean? What about feedback on the comments I quoted earlier in which an SP member discusses their organisng model and the factors in their groeth and electoral success?

quote:

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Originally posted by Lord Palmerston:
Fidel, you seem to describe anything that has ever been described as "socialist" as being so - whether it be Mao's China or the (now defunct) Swedish model.

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I think we should consider the legacies which former imperialist nations left to the revolutionaries to work with. It takes several generations to improve a country's mortality and literacy rates to a point where real achievement is possible. Gordon Sinclair once described a scene from his hotel room in Beijing in the late 1940's. He said he watched about two hundred or so Chinese gather in an empty lot across the street one night. By morning, they were all dead of malnutrition and exposure. Sinclair said he was an atheist from that point on in his life. A billion people needed change, and change comes at a price in most cases, imo.

A country with a billion people needs to be able to count bails of rice before food can be distributed properly. India's famine of the late 1990's saw rice rotting in silos while two million human beings starved to death. We should consider that communications in this day and age are so much better than they were in Mao's time. I think it's the difference between accidental mass starvation and planned genocide, enforced by IMF rules and regulations for trade in countries like democratic capitalist India.

I understand what you're saying about Sweden, L.P. It's not a true socialist country either, imo. But what other three countries in the world are plowing a third of GDP back into social programs and still rate in the top ten most competitive economies?. And I didn't throw in competitiveness issue to aggravate you. I think it does irritate the state capitalist nations though. Warshington uses every occasion possible to denounce the Scandinavian countries social economies sharing top spots with America on Harvard School of Bizness' list of indexed economies.

[ 24 November 2006: Message edited by: Fidel ]

quote:

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Something signifcant happens (the appearance of an anti-neoliberal, left of mainstream social democracy party as a major political force in a western european country), and within a few posts people on this thread are back to arguing about the 'hot issues' of 40-80 years ago.

Anyone have any comments on the Dutch SP, and what their success might (or might not) mean? What about feedback on the comments I quoted earlier in which an SP member discusses their organisng model and the factors in their groeth and electoral success?

I think their integration of grassroots community organising with electoral politics is really interesting and maybe something we could learn from over here.

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I read with great interest your excellent posts. About a month ago, I attended a seminar on how to make worker's issues and indirectly principles of the left more relevant within our increasingly right wing communities. I couldn't agree more with this excellent blue print as this is exactly what many of us were saying needs to be done.

I live in a very right wing town, but it's amazing how many are growing disillusioned with the failings of capitalism and are open to new ideas. After a few months of efforts we are close to unionising one of the city's largest remaining employer, our town held its first ever "diversity march" against racism (on the 15th anniversary of the town's last KKK march - no joke) and we are building support to take part in Ontario's upcoming referendum on PR. The Dutch election has been a major point of discussion that an alternative from neo-lib versus neo-con is possible.

I do agree it is time to move onto the future, unfortunately, there still remain some on the left who would rather dwell on the failings of other left models without ever offering their own solution.

Comments like Lord Palmerston's "now defunct" Swedish quote ignores the fact that although a neo-lib government recently won an election, they have been unable to roll back the extremely popular welfare state and are sinking faster than a stone in recent polls. The opposition left are currently leading 51.2% to 43.8%. Yes Sweden has strayed from it's original model but compared to us they still remain downright communist (or is that state capitalist?)

Opposition Holds the Upper Hand in Sweden

There is nothing "far left" about the SP, in fact they are refreshingly close to what a true democratic socialist party was meant to look like.

I will be passing on your post to our group and would welcome any more info about this novel approach to re-connect with the community anyone may have.

[ 24 November 2006: Message edited by: a lonely worker ]

[ 24 November 2006: Message edited by: a lonely worker ]

quote:

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Originally posted by Vansterdam Kid:
if the Labour Party was smart, they'd recognize that they should attempt to form a coalition with the Socialists being their junion partner.

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SP 26
Green Left 7
PvdD (animal right activists) 2
Labour Party (PvdA) 32
Democrats 66 (centre-left) 3
Christen Unie (CU), Calvinist and morally conservative but economically leftist, 6.

quote:

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Your ignoring every socialist contribution to what we are at risk of losing today to political forces pressing for the return of real laissez-faire state capitalism is a disservice to every socialist, union worker and grassroots political activist who has ever fought the good fight in making life worth living in North America, and Europe where mixed economies and social democracy exist today.

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Total insanity. Hey screwy, I have actually fought for some of those things, via the labour and cooperative movements and the NDP, so don’t whine about my ignoring the socialist contribution to making these things happen.

Socialists made them happen—and the fact that so many of these things are at least as good and many of them far better, especially with basic democratic rights and overall living standards, than the state capitalist dominated economies of the former Soviet Union, Eastern Bloc, China, etc., really says something about the practical evolutionary socialist efforts and projects of the labour and social democratic movements over the fascistic top-down Stalinist “vanguard” party and the “professional elite of revolutionaries” and their “trusted appointed capitalist experts to manage industry” (referred to in Lenin’s What is to Be Done and in State Capitalism During the Transition to Socialism), which setout to suppress many of those same initiatives.

quote:

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I give up. No, the Soviet Union was not state capitalist in the same sense that Nazi Germany was and the U.S.A continues to be today.

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I never said it was the same, Fidel. But the fact is it was/is predominantly state capitalist, by the admission and documented business plans of its leaders (which I have repeatedly posted here). Here's a couple more:

Lenin: Industrial Management under a State Capitalist Monopoly Framework

Lenin on State Capitalism During the Transition to Socialism excerpts

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A non-dollarized economy meant that the Soviet elite were comparatively well off only in the Soviet Union. The fortunes of the handful few multi-billionaires in the west dwarfed the life-styles and Russian bank accounts of the Soviets.

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Nope, wrong. According to what I have researched, the Stalinist regime boasted its first post-revolution millionaire, a senior executive director over a series of steel and industrial plants, in 1934. By 1948, when Tony Cliff wrote the book The Nature of Stalinist Russia there were over 600 multi-millionaires.

By 1991, CPSU reported there were over 60,000 multi-millionaire capitalists with over $60 billion dollars in bank accounts and private investments across the globe—and that does not include the
hundreds of billions of dollars worth of institutional investments and bank loans to countries and corporations. This is one way, according to socialist economist and five-time US Presidential candidate Erc Hass’ book Stalinist Imperialism: the economic forces behind Russian Expansionism the Soviet elite used to maintain its imperialist influence over other areas of the globe.

That’s a whole lot of capital sucked out of Soviet workers’ pockets and taken out of the real economy that helped create so much poverty and scarcity—a fundamental capitalistic practice.

Since the break-up of the Soviet Union, it’s gotten much worse. But according to Soviet figures quoted by Hass, the income gap between workers and bosses in the 1930s was almost as bad as today.

quote:

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In the Soviet Union, bureaucrats were considered the owners and benefactors of the means of production. I think exclusive property laws were one of the largest differences between Soviet communism and state capitalism in the west.

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First sentence is right. Second sentence is wrong. The fact these corporate bureaucracies held exclusive administrative authority over commercial assets and capital, with little or no accountability to the public makes them proprietors in all ways except a formality. So in fact there is no difference between this mythical “Soviet communism” and state capitalism, which, as shown, the Bolshevik elite set up to be just that.

The Nomenclatura Soviet-era Capitalism

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Unemployment is a tool of state capitalists used in the coercion of workers to accept lower wages and low working conditions. Workers in the Soviet Union were guaranteed jobs, and bread on the table.

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First sentence is true. First half of second sentence is not entirely true, and third part, the “bread on the table” part, is a joke in terms of lousy wages and working conditions. Anyone who goes through the archive reports by the International Confederation of Free Trade Unions clock the growing disparity in wages, consumer savings and working conditions between Eastern and Western bloc workers, and the fact that one of the ways the Soviet Union kept unemployment low was through extensive job sharing and part-time work hours during economic recessions—not much different, albeit for greater in scope, than what many European and Asian countries tried, and some still try, to do—many with far better conditions than the Eastern Bloc.

quote:

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Post-Secondary education and health care were free in the Soviet Union. Housing was free except for cost of utilities.

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First off, most rental housing was free if it was sponsored by the company you were working for. Different industries and ministries sponsored housing for employees. People not in sponsored housing had to pay their own way.

Secondly, these are all for sure impressive social reforms, and no one can say that the standard of living in the Eastern Bloc didn’t greatly improve because of them. But, again, they do not in any way negate that the economy was and is dominated by capitalistic economic policy, the same as in any other country.

And as impressive as these reforms were, they still, in many cases, come up as mediocre in comparison to many European and Asian economies in the same era. For example, post-secondary education and health care, as well as a massive amount of housing, was free in many European countries and Japan until the 1980s and 1990s—again many with better conditions than the Soviet Union. That still doesn’t mean their economies aren’t predominantly capitalist.

What it does mean is that in both the case of the Soviet/ Eastern Bloc and the West and North America, Asia, etc., the socialist and labour movements have been successful to varying degrees to influence the capitalist dominated economy. But it doesn’t mean that capitalism has disappeared.

quote:

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and you are way off topic as per usual with another one of your inane rants about "state capitalism." And you have only a little idea of what you're talking about anyway which makes it that much more indigestable. Give us a break!.

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Right, Fidel. Whatever you say. Just take a look at our respective posts and you can see my inane rants are fact-based reports, with sources, links and quotes, that I can produced because of research and a will to learn. Then compare this to your godly wisdom of superficial analysis, unsubstantiated claims, emotional filibusters and childish attacks and accusations. Then finally you can figure which one of us knows what we’re talking about.

quote:

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Man, I find a lot of 'the left' in Canada so frustrating at times.
Something signifcant happens (the appearance of an anti-neoliberal, left of mainstream social democracy party as a major political force in a western european country), and within a few posts people on this thread are back to arguing about the 'hot issues' of 40-80 years ago.

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Actually, Connolly, to a large degree I agree with you. But on this point I find myself in strange agreement with Fidel when he says:

quote:

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The past creates the present, Connoly.

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I do strongly feel that whatever the situation, you can’t really know where you’re going if you don’t know where you’ve been.

It has always really pained me that all of the successes of the socialist/social democratic movements, and their allied labour and cooperative movements, and the guilds and communes before them, pro-democracy, social justice and equality and ecology causes in to democratize our economies and societies are constantly slandered by being associated with regimes that oppose the very things we stand for and in fact have more in common with our opponents yet use our terms as masks to cover their own capitalistic agendas.

That still goes on today. It’s no coincidence that when we advocate for democratizing our society and especially our economy, and dare to use the historic names for this—like socialism or communism--the defenders of corporate capitalism and dictatorship often try to slanderously associate us with Stalinists, Nazis and Maoists, even though they have far more in common with them than with us, simply because they appropriated those names and divorced them from their historic economic meanings.

quote:

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Originally posted by Wilf Day:

With a one-seat majority? That would be:

SP 26
Green Left 7
PvdD (animal right activists) 2
Labour Party (PvdA) 32
Democrats 66 (centre-left) 3
Christen Unie (CU), Calvinist and morally conservative but economically leftist, 6.

But could they hold together?

---

Perhaps, for a short time anyways. If they can pick a few specific goals that have broad appeal, within their coalition.

Obviously they'd have to avoid social issues, otherwise that would alienate the CU - who would likely support the coalition on economic issues, but not "moral" ones. They would also have to avoid european integration, as it seems like something where Labour is for it and the Socialists are against it.

On the other hand, some of those parties may see those issues as being 'make or break', and thus not willing to see those issues be put aside for the sake of co-operation. All in all, it would be intresting to see whether or not they could put their diffrences aside, for the sake of what they hold in common.

Otoh, it may not be in certain parties best intrests to work togther. For instance an argument could be made that it's not in the Socialists best intrests to work with Labour. I say this because should Labour be the senior partners, in a centre to left coalition, and hold the Prime Minister's office, it stands to reason that they could get more credit for successes, and stall Socialist momentum.

Otoh, maybe Labour wouldn't be hurt, all that much by a deal with the Christian Democrats. It doesn't seem like the Left Party in Germany is benefiting all that much from the Social Democrats grand coalition with CDU/CSU...whereas the Social Democrats are marginally down from the last election, and the Left Party is marginally up. Although, at least one thing that's different in Germany. The Left Party is signficantly behind the Social Democrats, whereas the Socialist Party is only six seats behind Labour in the Netherlands.

German Polling Numbers

[ 25 November 2006: Message edited by: Vansterdam Kid ]

quote:

---

Originally posted by Steppenwolf Allende:
By 1991, CPSU reported there were over 60,000 multi-millionaire capitalists with over $60 billion dollars in bank accounts and private investments across the globe—and that does not include the hundreds of billions of dollars worth of institutional investments and bank loans to countries and corporations.

---

Your CPSU link doesn't work. And you're all over the place, from five year planning and Stalinism and then jumping several decades to perestroika reforms toward state capitalism under Gorbachev.

Yes, during perestroika years, there took place the criminal transfer of some 70 percent of state assets into private hands of 13 or more Russian oligarchs. An unprecedented concentration of wealth took place in Russia during that time, and the standard of living in the former USSR nose-dived from 1989 onward. The number of Russians living in poverty skyrocketed from an estimated two million in 1987 to some 60 million at the end of the 1990's with the introduction of market-style state capitalism and criminal sell-off of state assets and rights to natural resources, from nickel mines to vast Russian oil reserves.

quote:

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That’s a whole lot of capital sucked out of Soviet workers’ pockets and taken out of the real economy that helped create so much poverty and scarcity—a fundamental capitalistic practice.

---

That's a whole lot of perstroika reform toward state-capitalism. Standard of living had improved a great deal through the 1960's to mid 1970's, but the material acquisitiveness of real state capitalism was never developed in the USSR to nearly the same degree as in the west. Economic growth in the Soviet Union was roughly estimated to have been slightly higher than in the U.S. and western countries on average leading up to the 1970's.

But material consumption per person in the USSR was perhaps only ever a third of what it was in America by the start of economic decline in both the USSR and United States by mid 70's. They were two totally different economies, and direct comparisons were difficult to make on the basis of material consumption alone.

[ 25 November 2006: Message edited by: Fidel ]

quote:

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Originally posted by a lonely worker:
Comments like Lord Palmerston's "now defunct" Swedish quote ignores the fact that although a neo-lib government recently won an election, they have been unable to roll back the extremely popular welfare state and are sinking faster than a stone in recent polls. The opposition left are currently leading 51.2% to 43.8%. Yes Sweden has strayed from it's original model but compared to us they still remain downright communist (or is that state capitalist?)

---

Not true, because if you read my past posts here I've made this point well BEFORE the most recent election in Sweden. The Swedish model has eroded with the failure of the Meidner plan (the closest Sweden ever got to socialism) and then business pulling out of corporatist boards which served as the glue of the Swedish model. Swedish social democrats themselves have embraced neoliberalism too, just at a slower pace than the bourgeois parties. Anyway you contradict yourself by noting that "Sweden has strayed from its original model..."

quote:

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Originally posted by Lord Palmerston:

Not true, because if you read my past posts here I've made this point well BEFORE the most recent election in Sweden. The Swedish model has eroded with the failure of the Meidner plan (the closest Sweden ever got to socialism) and then business pulling out of corporatist boards which served as the glue of the Swedish model. Swedish social democrats themselves have embraced neoliberalism too, just at a slower pace than the bourgeois parties.

---

I understand what you're saying about the Meidner Plan. Keep in mind, we know that market socialists have existed since at least turn of the last century. Socialism is not rigid and inflexible like ne-Liberalism failing so many developing countries today. And there still exists a number of publicly-owned services and utilites throughout the western world. Privatization of utilities like water and electrical power generation and distribution are proving to be a lesson in corruption and poor service right here in North America. The Swede's are not as convinced of the benefits of privatization as political conservatives were from Thatcher-Reagan-Mulroney era to now. It's a struggle of ideologies that continues today for a lack of the right being able to show real cost-benefit for privatization of public assets.

We should understand that neo-Liberal schemes for privatization is a gimmick implemented in 1980's Chile and to a lesser degree with partial privatizations in Sweden beginning around 2001. Sweden's experience with partial privatization of pension funds is found to be similar to neo-Liberal reforms in Pinochet's Chile with a marked increase in cost of management fees followed by a decrease in pension funds available to the working class population. The Swede's banned the building of new private hospitals in 2004 over concerns of quality and access. How much more neo-Liberalism will the pragmatic Swede's endure ?.

And as someone who comes from a heavily Ukrainian area, I cannot but marvel at the leaps you will take to defend the record of the USSR. Those Ukrainians who died in state-induced famine throughout the ages, who were rounded up ande sent to concentration camps, whose culture and identity were suppressed each and every day of Soviet rule, they deserve better than to be swept under the mat by your ideological fervour. And they were not alone. The violence we see in places like Chechnya, the strife and discord there has been in the Baltic states, and many other manifestations of painful re-assertion of identity are a direct result of the awful brutality that was the USSR.

It's simple, state-capitalism requires an interventionist state government, and a capitalist class to own the means of production. Large capital reserves and stockpiling of product allows capitalists to hold out in strike situations longer than the average three months estimated for workers with obligations to pay rent, mortgages, taxes, food and utilities in a true-to-form state-capitalist economy.

quote:

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Originally posted by Coyote:
I know people, here, who fled Russia two steps ahead of a bullet in their head for the sin of practicing their religion, and refusing to hide who they were. There is your glorious revolution.

---

And I know some Ukrainian emigres to Canada whose relatives were marched out of Ukraine in 1941 and never heard from again. If the famine wasn't enough, several million more Ukrainians were missing from that country in 1945. So what's your point ?. Are you saying the Russians and Eastern Bloc nations deserved to die off in the order of several million as a direct result of perestroika reforms toward state-capitalism ?. Save your history lesson for a thread on that topic, Coyote. We've meandered off this trail a few posts back.

[ 25 November 2006: Message edited by: Fidel ]

Or to quote Camus:
- Avez-vous la certitude qu'il s'agit de la peste?
- Ce n'est pas une question de vocabulaire, c'est une question de temps.

quote:

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A ruthless struggle is going on between the peasantry and our regime. It's a struggle to the death. This year (1933) was a test of our strength and their endurance. It took a famine to show them who is master here. It has cost millions of lives, but the collective farm system is here to stay, We've won the war."

---

quote:

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Originally posted by Coyote:
Well I think that's nonsense, Fidel, and so did Lenin.

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quote:

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Are you saying the Russians and Eastern Bloc nations deserved to die off in the order of several million as a direct result of perestroika reforms toward state-capitalism ?

---

I find externally imposed collectivization as absurd as I find externally imposed privatization. I find artificial famines imposed to break the will of a people - be it the action of imperialist England in Ireland or Communist Russia in Ukraine - morally repugnant, and beyond defence.

You would seem to feel otherwise when the people who do the killing shout the same slogans you do. I call that the deformation of humanity through ideology.

quote:

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Originally posted by Coyote:

- Hatayevich, Secretary of the Regional Committee of the Dnipropetrovsk Communist Party

---

quote:

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Originally posted by Coyote:
I'm not the one defending brutality in the furtherance of political objectives, Fidel. And I never will be. But you have an uncomfortable unwillingness to confront the truth of what your glorious revolution means and has meant in actual human terms.

---

Look, I don't know who you think you're lecturing about the harships of the 1930's, but my close relatives lived the dirty 30's here in Canada and United States. There were stories of whole families in Montreal being thrown out of apartments into the streets. There were Canadians running all over the county hungry and looking for work. By the time 1939 rolled around, the army on both sides of the border said they'd never seem so many emaciated young men unfit for combat.

[ 25 November 2006: Message edited by: Coyote ]

quote:

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Originally posted by Coyote:
Response here.

[ 25 November 2006: Message edited by: Coyote ]

---

I think it was your gaff about Lenin's definition of state-capitalism holding true after the demise of "state capitalism" around the western world in 1929 and several years after his death.

So, no where in your quote do I even mention Stalin's deliberate famine in Ukraine or other policies for wild west shoot'em up of white Russians and leftists alike. But you seem to you've been granted carte blanche put words in my mouth and launch a totally bizarro personal attack on me.

[ 25 November 2006: Message edited by: Fidel ]

quote:

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Originally posted by Coyote:
I'm also more than a little disgusted that you would use the slaughter of Jewish people at the hands of Ukrainian partisans to get in a dig at me.

---

quote:

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Essentially, the means of production were controlled by elite bureaucrats and functionnaires, operating in the place of the heads of private corporations. What you describe as state capitalism and ascribe to fascist entities those fascist entities describe as corporatism, most clearly Mussolini.

---

Exchanging sometimes harsh words is not fun, but sometimes confrontation is good. I will admit that I probably went overboard with my charges against Fidel - he has here clearly referred to Stalin's deliberate policy of starvation against Ukraine, and his wild attacks on any form of political opposition.

quote:

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Originally posted by Fidel:
So your view of state capitalism doesn't actually require that there be any capitalists, just the state and some bureaucrats to take advantage of privileges, vacations on the Crimea, a larger shoe box to live in, a few crates of caviar once in a while, and all medical expenses paid against a backdrop of the late 1920's and 30's. I see.

---

quote:

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Originally posted by Coyote:
But of course, VK.

We're alot alike, Fidel. We both come out guns a-blazing and we care passionately about what we believe in. Your perspective of the Soviet Union - which I hope you would not object to me characterizing as more sympathetic than not, but let me know if that is not the case to your mind - runs directly into my indentification with the Ukrainian community, though I am not Ukrainian myself. That is what happened here, from my perspective.

---

quote:

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Your CPSU link doesn't work. And you're all over the place, from five year planning and Stalinism and then jumping several decades to perestroika reforms toward state capitalism under Gorbachev.

---

The CPSU link worked yesterday. I don't know why it doesn't now. But, FYI, some of the same info is quoted in a US Congress Library report on trade between the US and the Soviet Union:

Soviet Era capitalism and Wealth Distribution in Russia

And I'm not the one all over the map. You keep ignoring the fact the economies of the Soviet Union, and to a lesser extent the former republics today, China, Eastern Europe, etc. were/are predominantly state capitalist, by both the admission of the post-revolution Leninist and Maoist governments, as well as Stalin and a whole host of direct info, economic analysis and documentation that I and others have referred to here and on other threads.

Instead of seeing this and getting on with it, you keep hurling out all sorts of interesting yet largely unrelated events and put-downs and going off on silly one-up-man-ship of comparative rottenness between the Soviet Union and the US..

quote:

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That's a whole lot of perstroika reform toward state-capitalism.

---

No, that's a whole lot of state capitalism that was set up and put into motion by the Bolshevik government, via the New Economic Policy, after it had fully consolidated power in 1921.

Again:

Lenin on State Capitalism During the Transition to Socialism

Lenin: Introduction to the New Economic Policy

Stalin on State Capitalism to Close the Historic Gap Between Russia and the West

Whether you like it or not, Perestroika was a desperate effort to save that state monopoly capitalist system from itself.

quote:

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It's simple, state-capitalism requires an interventionist state government, and a capitalist class to own the means of production.

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That describes just about every form of capitalism ever practiced, Fidel. And the economies of the Soviet Union, China etc, fit quite well into that model, as we have already seen.

quote:

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Large capital reserves and stockpiling of product allows capitalists to hold out in strike situations longer than the average three months estimated for workers with obligations to pay rent, mortgages, taxes, food and utilities in a true-to-form state-capitalist economy.

---

Not entirely. In most capitalist economies throughout the world, including in the Soviet Union, China, etc, strikes are illegal altogether and brutally suppressed.(although they still take place regardless). And workers who are under some corporate-sponsored housing program, as seen in many countries, may get housing and food allowances as part of their pay packages (a common program in the Soviet Union). They are still capitalist dominated economies.

quote:

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Standard of living had improved a great deal through the 1960's to mid 1970's, but the material acquisitiveness of real state capitalism was never developed in the USSR to nearly the same degree as in the west

---

That Soviet era capitalists of various types didn't get quite as rich as their western counterparts in irrelevant. As the facts and sources posted previously show, wealth accumulation during that era was huge, starting with the gross excesses under the Stalinist regime, unions were busted and wages were driven down to zip, forced labour became the norm, and state-owned corporations and their bosses became hugely wealthy leading to a whole new generation of millionaires investing cash outside the country--a practice that still continues there today (more so than ever).

quote:

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They were two totally different economies, and direct comparisons were difficult to make on the basis of material consumption alone.

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They were/are very different economies in many ways. But the facts clearly show they shared most of the same basic capitalistic fundamentals, albeit applied in their own unique ways in relation to their market and political conditions.

[ 26 November 2006: Message edited by: Steppenwolf Allende ]

quote:

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Originally posted by Coyote:
In essence, that the act in the same manner as the heads of private corporations, but under the auspices of the state. I don't think that's a contentious thesis. You do. Fine. But I'm not alone in positing this definition.

---

As I've noted before, what you refer to as state capitalism I think better fits with what Mussolini referred to as Corporatism:

quote:

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Fascism should more properly be called corporatism because it is the merger of state and corporate power.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Steppenwolf Allende:
Whether you like it or not, Perestroika was a desperate effort to save that state monopoly capitalist system from itself.

---

The Soviet Union experienced several problems in the 1980's due to corruption(a problem we still face in Canada and the U.S.), shortages of food staples but not for a lack of Kremlin efforts to barter for citrus, cocoa, wheat etc Russian gold and oil for these items. Our colonial administrators took orders from Washington not to sell wheat to the USSR, and then Washington did a 180 and did just that themselves. It was the cold war, and what hurt the Soviet economy the most was OPEC nations, mainly Saudi Arabia, dumping cheap oil on world markets in 1985-87 irresponsibly or on purpose, and all the while, and with the US and Britain and Pakistan, waged a proxy war in Afghanistan and ripping that country apart from stern to stem. By comparison, the "starve the beast" Republicans today appear far more fiscally irresponsible with running up the largest national debts in the history of the solar system.

But there are still many political conservatives who insist that the Soviet economy disintegrated all on its own, which is nonsense. It was a trillion dollar taxpayer-funded cold war waged by a small group of "state capitalist" nations that suffocated the Soviet economy. By comparison, state capitalism in 1930's America and 1980's Chile did collapse without cold war being waged on those countries. Laissez-faire state capitalism lasted 30 years - Soviet communism: 70.

Jeffrey Sachs and a team of Harvard and Princeton economists convinced Gorbachev and others that the Soviet economy was in the doldrums, that it could be more efficient and bla bla bla. I think Gorbachev and company were more concerned about the effects of cold war embargos than they were about "economic efficiency", especially after the Chicago School of Economics experiment in Chile went awry after sixteen years of perfect conditions for "state capitalism" conducted in a humanrights vacuum. The results of perestroika were nothing less than horrific. Poverty in Russia increased 3000 percent by the end of the 1990's. Millions perished while average life expectancy plummeted. Vlad Putin describes the dissolution of the USSR and perestroika as the biggest tragedy of the last century.

And the real reason Russia's economy is expanding today is not due to the Jeffrey Sachs' "shock" therapy reforms toward state-capitalism in the 1990's. It's because the Saudi's are working with the Russians today in maintaining high world il prices.

quote:

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That describes just about every form of capitalism ever practiced, Fidel. And the economies of the Soviet Union, China etc, fit quite well into that model, as we have already seen.

---

China is unique in that it was able to avoid the mistakes of IMF and Washington consensus for market reforms as occurred in Russia, Africa, Thailand, East Timor, and Latin America. Vlad Lenin would not have recognized "state capitalism" after 1929, let alone Hitler's Germany or the U.S.A. with it's Keynesian-militarism. I think Lenin would be astounded with China and seeing capitalist dogs on such short leashes.

quote:

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In most capitalist economies throughout the world, including in the Soviet Union, China, etc, strikes are illegal altogether and brutally suppressed.

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China is home to the only unionized Walmart Dept Stores in the world despite Walmart's attempts to prevent bottom-up unionization. In fact, no government in the world tolerates as many street protests and student actions as China has over the last two and a half decades.

quote:

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They are still capitalist dominated economies.

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... with five state-controlled banks approx. one-sixth owned by foreign investment and still controlling most of the countries' commercial and personal loans. China's state banks loaned Putin enough money to re-nationalise Yukos Oil, Siberian gas fields and a few service sector enterprises. That's not very perestroika.

quote:

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Tenth Five Year Plan: At present, public economy accounts for more than 30 percent of the commodity circulation in China, of which, the public sector takes up more than 20 percent, the collective economy, more than 10 percent, and other economic sectors, more than 60 percent...

---

Hmmm, sounds like a mixed market economy with lots of state intervention to me. Capitalists who lived during Lenin's time would have described interventionist governments as communist. But what would state-capitalists from that era know about capitalism? - by the looks of things after 1929, not a lot.

The Chinese state demands controlling interest, or a large minority share in all foreign-based corporations doing business in China. During the cold war, western economists and politicians would have described it as communism. Can you imagine our weak and ineffective leaders in Ottawa demanding a share in Walmart Superstores operating in Canada ?. GM? Ford ?. In your dreams!

quote:

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That Soviet era capitalists of various types didn't get quite as rich as their western counterparts in irrelevant

---

Tourists owned more than the average Soviet Politburo elitist. There were no former Haliburton CEO's or corporate board staffers in the Kremlin

[ 26 November 2006: Message edited by: Fidel ]

quote:

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the party would not agree to a coalition with the Christian Democrat CDA and ChristenUnie because the risk is too great that the SP will again improve at the next election.

The PvdA stance means the coalition formation could become a very difficult and lengthy process. Majority-rule combinations without the CDA and PvdA are almost out of the question.

Meanwhile, a re-division of votes on Friday saw the SP lose one seat to end up with 25 seats in the Dutch Parliament and the PvdA gain one seat to finish up with 33. The Christian Democrat has 41 seats and the Liberal VVD 22.

---

Sharon Dijksma, Labour, first elected at age 23.

Martin Van Dam, Labour, first elected at age 24.

Krista Velzen, Socialist, first elected when she was 27.

Nebahat Albayrak, Labour, born in Turkey, first elected at age 30.

Naima Azough, GreenLeft, born in Morocco, first became an MP at age 31.

Fatma Koser Kaya, Democrats 66 (left-liberal), born in Turkey, first became an MP at age 36.

[ 26 November 2006: Message edited by: Wilf Day ]

quote:

---

Pretty off topic, Wilf.

---

I hope you're being sarcastic because Wilf's post is exactly what this topic is about. You and a couple of other state capitalist posters continue to hijack threads by turning what is a great victory for what appears to be a very progressive party into the same diatribe against Stalin, Castro or Mao (how come no Pol Pot or Kim Jung Il too?). I'm sure it's no coincidence that whenever a democratic socialist wins an election they always hear the same names from the right wing. The reason I like to read babble is to get away from this red baiting shite.

You started your other thread see if anyone's dumb enough to bite.

Sorry for the rant but I'm tired of the same people who claim to be "pure leftists" who can't just celebrate a great victory without raising "S" words like state capitalism or Stalin? These tactics remind me of another so called "pure leftist" Christopher Hitchens who is merely an attack dog for the neo-cons.

Back to the topic, thanks for posting Wilf and others. Please keep us posted of developments.

If you were being sarcastic, my apologies. I'm just tired of scrolling through the same circular debates from posters who will always regurgitate the same anti-Soviet crap whenever a positive development occurs somewhere. Some of us just want to hear some positive news occasionally without hearing about Stalin's many failings.

[ 26 November 2006: Message edited by: a lonely worker ]

quote:

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the party would not agree to a coalition with the Christian Democrat CDA and ChristenUnie because the risk is too great that the SP will again improve at the next election.

The PvdA stance means the coalition formation could become a very difficult and lengthy process. Majority-rule combinations without the CDA and PvdA are almost out of the question.

Meanwhile, a re-division of votes on Friday saw the SP lose one seat to end up with 25 seats in the Dutch Parliament and the PvdA gain one seat to finish up with 33. The Christian Democrat has 41 seats and the Liberal VVD 22.

---

Yet, Labour isn't willing to form a coalition with the SP either. It's kind of hard to tell what they want to do. Maybe they'll move to the left themselves, but it sounds like their positioning is too nuanced, to do that either. For instance, they're more tolerant than the VVD, and Christian Democrats, with regards to immigrants, but not quite what I'd refer to as tolerant either.

It sounds like they find the SP offensive. Or maybe they're worried they'd legitimize the SP - but it sounds like the SP is fuelled by protest voters. And every now and then protests overwhelm established forces, if some of the protesters demands aren't met. It seems more logical to assume that a potential Labour-SP coalition, where the experienced hands in Labour implement certain SP demands, could present themselves as responding to SP voter concerns, while being more moderate, reasonable and experienced than the SP thus stealing their thunder on various fronts.

If the SP is part of any coalition it should be in complete control of some key ministries or with clear demands of key issues that are critical to their platform.

The neo-lib parties will try to box them in and I suspect they realise this. This should be extremely interesting.

BTW, coyote I'm glad you are pleased with the SP's victory and were only joking with that previous post.

quote:

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Originally posted by Vansterdam Kid:
Yet, Labour isn't willing to form a coalition with the SP either.

---

quote:

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Labour PvdA is reportedly not prepared to enter into a coalition government without the Socialist SP.

---

quote:

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Labor leader Wouter Bos said Balkenende should discuss forming a coalition with the Socialist Party, which made dramatic gains Wednesday, before it talks to Labor.

Labor, which had 42 seats in the outgoing parliament, should proceed cautiously, he said, adding: "A party that lost 10 seats should be modest."

The Christian Democrats and Socialists would still need the support of another party to form a majority.

---

I'd also like to point out(thanks to the "International" page of the Dutch SP website)the best news of all in the Dutch election:

The Pym Fortuyn List lost ALL of its seats.
Anytime a racist, reactionary party is wiped off the electoral map anywhere, people of good will should celebrate.

Somewhere, Anne Frank is smiling.

http://www.brusselsjournal.com/node/1682

quote:

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Marijnissen’s leftism is most apparent in the economic policies he proposes – protectionism, higher taxes for the rich, state interference to curtail the “greed” of the markets, an end to privatisations, free healthcare, more social benefits for the poor,… On cultural [Americans would say “social”] issues, however, the SP has become ever more conservative. During the past decade its ideology moved towards communitarianism. Marijnissen even rediscovered his former Christian faith. One of his supporters is Monsignor Tiny (Martinus) Muskens, the “red” Bishop of Breda, who once said that stealing is not a sin for the poor, but who also stressed that dialogue between Christians and Muslims will lead nowhere so long it remains impossible to build churches in Saudi Arabia. The SP’s party conference last month resembled a Christian meeting. Huub Oosterhuis, a Dutch theologian and former priest who was excommunicated by the Vatican over sexual ethics, held a sermon extolling the virtues of Christianity. The audience sang psalms and listened to gospel music. In this sense the SP, though one of the most anti-American of the Dutch parties, seemed almost the most American of them.

---

I guess whoever was wise enough to vote for GreenLeft can sleep well at night.

[ 27 November 2006: Message edited by: CommieCowboy ]

quote:

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The Pym Fortuyn List lost ALL of its seats.
Anytime a racist, reactionary party is wiped off the electoral map anywhere, people of good will should celebrate.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Stockholm:
The Left Party is largely composed of PSD members from East Germany many of whom were Stasi agents in the DDR, it would be like handling plutonium to deal with them in a coalition.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Stockholm:

Before you celebrate you better note that the new equally racist Party of Freedom won 10 seats. It seems like in Holland these xenophobic anti-immigrant parties are like toadstools - you piuck one and three more grow back in the same place.

---

quote:

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Labor leader Wouter Bos believes Balkenende should first talk to Jan Marijnissen, the ex-communist whose Socialist Party made the biggest gains in the election.

Marijnissen believes the policy differences between his party and the Christian Democrats are too big to allow them to rule together.

Rein Jan Hoekstra, who was appointed by Queen Beatrix to oversee the coalition talks, said he would begin meeting party leaders on Tuesday to map out possible alliances able to command a majority in Parliament's 150-seat lower house.

Hoekstra said that despite the splintered Parliament he did not want to discuss a minority government.

"With an eye to durability and stability, we need to look for a majority Cabinet," he said.

"If I thought this was a mission impossible, I would not have accepted it," he said.

---

[ 27 November 2006: Message edited by: Wilf Day ]

quote:

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Originally posted by Stockholm:
The Left Party is largely composed of PSD members from East Germany many of whom were Stasi agents in the DDR, it would be like handling plutonium to deal with them in a coalition.

---

"Stasi agents"? Oh Puhleeze. Maybe a few dozen, but most true Stasi guys went capitalist when the Wall fell. Most of those guys never gave a flying fuck for socialism.

I can't believe you'd actually be spewing McCarthyism on Babble, Stockholm.

And another ten years of excluding the Left Party means Germany being consigned to another ten years of neoliberalism and austerity being completely unchallenged. The SPD has no left-of-centre views on its own anymore, and the Greens sold out long ago. Its only the Left Party that speaks for the poor and the workers in Germany now.

Do YOU think they were right to kill Luxemburg and Liebknecht as well, Stockholm? When you think of it, that really makes it the SPD's fault that Hitler and Stalin gained all that power, because it was them who deprived the world of a humane radical alternative.

quote:

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Originally posted by CommieCowboy:
It seems the "Socialist" Party is filled with religious nuts and xenophobes...

http://www.brusselsjournal.com/node/1682

I guess whoever was wise enough to vote for GreenLeft can sleep well at night.

[ 27 November 2006: Message edited by: CommieCowboy ]

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The article you've quotedis from a blog by a right-wing nutbar who's married to a politician from the Flemish fascist "Vlaams Blok" party. I'd take it with a grain of salt (see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Belien or http://www.brusselsjournal.com/paulbelien to find out more)

Even if the article isn't entirely factually out to lunch, based on the bit you quoted here, this doesn't really sound to me like the SP has a problem with 'religious nuts.' Any party of the left that's going to be successful has to figure a way of working with the more socially progressive elements of various religious communities and dealing with the religious sensibilities of many working class people. This has been going on in the latin american left for decades (and even today, Hugo Chavez talks a lot about 'Christian ethics,' etc.).

As far as xenophobia, I don't know about individual members, but here are some quotes from the SP platform that seem to suggest otherwise:

quote:

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[...] An open-hearted policy on refugees and asylum seekers is the cornerstone of a civilised society[...]

6. Living together
We choose to live together and we are therefore against division of our society along ethnic lines. The failure of the integration policy of the last years must be thoroughly studied in order to formulate an effective policy this time. We formulate a massive campaign for integration of minorities, in which we counteract the growing division between native and migrant children in schools, that lead to white and black schools. We promote integration in neighbourhoods as well.

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...and this article from the French newspaper l'Humanite translated on the SP webiste:

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http://international.sp.nl/bericht/12559/061124-dutch_socialist_party_the_reasons_for_their_success.html

The SP's strength resides primarily in its capacity to resist the spirit of consensus which often deprives the Dutch electorate of a political alternative. This is true of social questions, such as immigration, where they lately proposed a generous right of asylum in the face of the restrictive plans of the right and Labour,

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http://international.sp.nl/bericht/2177/050909-god_socialism_and_the_market_economy.html

God, Socialism and the Market Economy

September 9th, 2005 • Column by Ronald van Raak. Member of the Dutch Senate for the Socialist Party, at the Annual Conference 2005 of the Ecumenical Association of Academies and Lay Centres in Europe, 9th September, Dominican Activity Centre, Huissen, The Netherlands.

Religion is ‘hot’. There is a growing number of young Muslims, that do not only watch MTV, but also visit the mosque. In August over a million youngsters had gathered during an international meeting of Roman Catholics in Cologne. Many of them carried a condom in their inside pocket, but also cheered for the Pope. Political leaders often openly profess their religiosity. George Bush does, and Tony Blair does and of course our Dutch Prime Minister, Jan Peter Balkenende does. But in spite the massive attention the Pope receives from young persons, not many of them join our Prime Minister’s Christian-democratic party. The two smaller Christian parties in the Netherlands, the Christian Union and the SGP, are more successful in binding young people. And perhaps to your surprise, another political party seems to be attractive for religious young people, my own Socialist Party (SP).

The SP is the fastest growing political party in the Netherlands. By now it’s the third largest political party in membership. More than thirty years ago the party started as a group of small and local action groups, especially in the southern, Roman Catholic parts of the country. Here the socialists fought against the dominance of the former Catholic party and of the Roman Catholic Church in general. Most members of the SP considered themselves non-religious. Nowadays the attitude towards religion within the party seems to have changed. As a growing number of members call themselves religious and many regularly visit a church.

Recently the Centre for Policy Studies of the SP published a book on the future of socialism, for which present socialists where asked to comment upon classical socialist texts. The book starts with an essay written by the famous Dutch priest Huub Oosterhuis, who wrote about ‘The revolution of the Bible’. Last year the youth organisation of the SP invited me to speak at their meeting which was given the title ‘Christ for dummies’. In fact, two out of the four members of the SP-group in the Dutch Senate are church going.

What has gone wrong with the Dutch Socialist Party? Why do so many Roman Catholic people, but also Protestants, Muslims, Jews, Hindus and other religious people, think the SP offers them a good political alternative? Why have so many socialists left the idea made very explicit by Karl Marx, that religion is opium for the people?

The death of God
The Netherlands still is a secular society. Secularism is seen by most Dutchmen as an attainment of the Enlightenment. A philosophical highlight of this enlightened view of man is the death of God, as declared by Friedrich Nietzsche. But if one analyses the proposed aphorism more accurately, one realizes that for Nietzsche the death of God was not a happy occurrence, but a horrifying one.

In aphorism 125 of The Gay Science, written in 1882, in the bright morning hours a madman lights a lantern and runs to the market, crying ‘I seek God!’ At this part he provokes much laughter to his audience. He then jumps into their midst and pierces through them with his eyes: ‘I will tell you.’ He says. ‘We have killed him - you and I. All of us are his murderers. But how did we do this? ... Who gave us the sponge to wipe away the entire horizon?’ This madman wanted to teach the people that the death of God was not an act of liberation, but a loss of meaning and understanding: ‘Do we not feel the breath of empty space? Has it not become colder?’

Here the madman fell silent and again looked at his listeners, but they stared at him in astonishment. At the end he threw his lantern on the ground, and it broke into pieces. ‘I have come too early,’ he then said: ‘my time is not yet.’ The same day the madman forced his way into several churches, where he said: ‘What after all are these churches now if they are not the tombs and sepulchres of God?’

God and socialism
It is easy to declare God dead, but that still doesn’t solve the questions to which God once was an answer. For most religious people God is a fundament for public morality. And if one looks at morality I see some possible points of agreement between Christianity and socialism. Could one, for example, compare the Christian concept of neighbourly love with the socialist idea of solidarity? Or the Christian ideal of men as keeper of Gods creation with the socialist ideal of economic sustainability? The Bible shows us the importance of brotherhood. Marx’s Communist Manifesto could teach us why brotherhood in our society is not possible. It shows us why the difference between our richness and the poverty of others is not a tragedy, but an avoidable situation. Both books, the Bible and the Communist Manifesto show how important it is to make sure that nobody starves while others choke in abundance. In history, many revolts against oppression and poverty were organised in the name of Christ, by priests in Latin America, but in Western Europe as well. Domela Nieuwenhuis, who in 1888 was the first socialist MP in the Netherlands, was a revolutionary and a cleric at the same time.

The ideas and activities of the SP are guided by three moral concepts: human dignity, equivalence, and solidarity. By human dignity we mean the respect of one person for the other, a secure existence for everyone, and a fair chance for every person to pursue, in full respect for others, his or her personal happiness. A civilised society demands the fundamental recognition that all people are of equal worth. To treat everyone equally demands broad tolerance throughout society. If we insist that everyone is of equal value, we at the same time recognise that not everyone is equal in terms of opportunity. Because of this, we must constantly organize solidarity between people, helping and caring for each other wherever necessary and giving everyone a real chance to lead a fulfilling life.

The morality of market economy
Bush in the United States, Blair in Great Britain and Balkenende in the Netherlands declare themselves to be Christians. But al three of them, in my opinion, embrace an idol, of market economy. This idolatry is based upon a metaphysical idea of an invisible hand, which controls all human affairs. This idea has its very own morality. In brief: it promotes the idea of a human being as a rational individual, who needs to be in competition with other individuals and whose prosperity lies in material gains. Free market economy makes high promises; it wants us to belief that it respects the natural differences between people, by giving the individual total freedom for the benefit of it’s own development.
One of the main political aims of Balkenende is a public debate about the moral state of our society. But this Christian Prime Minister, who now leads a coalition government with two liberal parties, also shows himself to be a promoter of free market economy. I think these economic politics put Balkenende in a moral dilemma. Which moral does he want to promote? Is this a Christian morality, which emphasises a strong sense of community, neighbourly love and spiritual welfare? Or a free market morality, which promotes individualism, competition and materialism?

A new coalition?
Could old enemies ever become new friends? A lot of my socialist friends have declared that God is dead. But most of them have learnt the meaning of Nietzsche’s madman, who taught them that the death of God was not only an act of liberation, but also a loss of meaning and understanding. A growing number of the SP-members turn themselves to Marx ánd Jesus at the same time, to find a new horizon for their moral principles.

If I ask my Christian friends which moral principles they prefer, they never choose individualism, competition and materialism and always feel themselves comfortable with moral concepts like human dignity, equivalence, and solidarity. ‘What after all are these churches now, if they are not the tombs and sepulchres of God?’, Nietzsche’s madman asks. I am sure that if we seriously take into consideration the moral tasks given to us by both Marx ánd Christ, a new coalition against the cold and empty space of market economy is possible.

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My tabby is very excited about how the Party of the Animals has won two seats!!!

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LOL

Anyone know if animal rights is really that big an issue in the Netherlands, or was this more of a protest vote?

I found an English language version of a website that uses an online questionaire to help Dutch voters chose which party best matches their own opinions, and one of the 30 or so agree/disagree statements is:

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"Statement 27
The rights of animals should be safeguarded in the Constitution."

http://www.stemwijzer.nl/votematch2k2006/app.html

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The PvdA feels a responsibility to co-operate with a new coalition. Bos said after his talk with Hoekstra that politicians must be able to step around underlying differences.

"You cannot ask the faith of millions of voters and than remain nicely left-wing in the opposition," he said.

Bos and Marijnissen also stressed a CDA, PvdA and SP coalition could count on solid support in Parliament. "If the CDA is smart, it will go with it. It has enormous support of 99 seats," Marijnissen said.

Marijnissen wants his party to be given a serious chance in the coalition formation talks now that his party emerged as the big winner from last week's elections.

He said the scaling down and equalising of income differences were the biggest issues for his party in the upcoming coalition talks.

He did not want to speak about possible deadlock issues, but the SP is calling for reduction in the tax deduction scheme offered on mortgage interest rate payments. The CDA is opposed to any cut in the so-called hypotheekrenteaftrek.

Liberal VVD leader Mark Rutte said he is not in favour of a CDA, PvdA and SP coalition, stressing that it will only create problems due to large policy differences over the hypotheekrenteaftrek, the AOW pension and a general amnesty for the group of 26,000 asylum seekers.

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ChristenUnie leader André Rouvoet told informateur Rein Jan Hoekstra that a coalition of the CDA, PvdA and SP was the most obvious.

Earlier, it had been suggested that a coalition government could be made up of the CDA, PvdA and the smaller ChristenUnie because of large policy differences between the CDA and SP.

But Rouvoet told Hoekstra — who is chairing the difficult coalition formation talks — that the ChristenUnie would not join a coalition government.

The ChristenUnie doubled its representation in Parliament at last week's elections, moving from three to six seats. But Rouvoet said that was a moderate win compared with the SP's gain, which moved from nine to 25 seats.

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Such a showing demands its role in government.

If the CDA and SP cannot reconcile its differences, can the Netherlands?

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New Dutch MPs on the left who will be part of such a government (wouldn't it be nice to live in a country where every vote counted, and MPs reflected the diversity of the population?):

Lea Bouwmeester, 27, Labour, youngest woman elected at this election

Renske Leijten, 27, Socialist (female)

Attje Kuiken, 29, Labour (female)

Sharon Gesthuizen, 30, Socialist

Sadet Karabulut, 31, Socialist (female)

Rosita Van Gijlswijk, 32, Socialist

Paul Lempens, 32, Socialist

Nathalie De Rooij, 33, Socialist

Marianne Besselink, 34, Labour

Marianne Langkamp, 35, Socialist

Jasper Van Dijk, 35, Socialist

Samira Bouchibti, 36, born in Marocco, Labour

Chantal Gill'ard, 36, Labour

Ronald Van Raak, 37, Socialist

Roos Vermeij, 38, Labour (female)

Ton Heerts, 39, Labour

Hans Spekman, 40, Labour

Emile Roemer, 44, Socialist

Agnes Wolbert, 48, Labour

Lutz Jacobi, 50, Labour (female)

Henk Van Gerven, 51, Socialist

Paulus Jansen, 52, Socialist

Hans Van Leeuwen, 54, Socialist

Paul Ulenbelt, 54, Socialist

Ron Abel, 56, Socialist

Paul Kalma, 58, Labour

Eelke Van der Veen, 60, Labour (male)

Fons Luijben, 64, Socialist

Note: the leader of the Party for Animals is
Marianne Thieme, 34. Her seat-mate is Esther Ouwehand, 30.

[ 01 December 2006: Message edited by: Wilf Day ]

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The new Dutch parliament approved a motion on Thursday night calling for a general amnesty for thousands of asylum seekers who entered the country before tougher immigration laws came into force in 2001.

Immigration Minister Rita Verdonk is yet to respond to the shock 75-74 vote, which came during an emergency debate in the parliament's first session since elections were held on 22 November.

The new parliament supported a motion by the Labour PvdA granting up to 26,000 long-term asylum seekers the right to stay.

The coalition government made up of the Christian Democrat CDA and Liberal VVD had previously ordered the deportation of 26,000 asylum seekers who had lodged applications to stay before 2001 and were still living in the country.

Under Verdonk's supervision, at least 12,000 were deported or left voluntarily.

But in a sign that last week's elections shifted the balance of power in Dutch politics, the parliamentary vote signals an easing of the country's four-year crackdown on immigration.

The CDA of Prime Minister Jan Peter Balkenende and Verdonk's VVD opposed the motion, along with smaller right-wing parties, but it was carried with unanimous support from parties on the left.

The Parliament has called on the government to decide before Tuesday how it will respond to the motion. Verdonk said the caretaker Cabinet will discuss the matter on Friday, while PvdA leader Wouter Bos said an extremely difficult situation would develop if Verdonk refused to grant the pardon.

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Message to the CDA: play nicely, or we'll play without you.

[ 03 December 2006: Message edited by: Wilf Day ]

[ 03 December 2006: Message edited by: Wilf Day ]

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The CDA-VVD cabinet has defied the parliamentary motion lodged by Labour PvdA leader Wouter Bos and passed with 75-74 majority in the 150-seat parliament.

Balkenende is highly critical of Bos' actions. The PvdA leader considers the passing of the motion a victory, but Balkenende accused him of playing chess on two boards.

He said the issue of a general amnesty should be discussed during coalition formation talks and that Bos should not try and enforce his will via a "coincidental majority" in the new Lower House of Parliament.

Bos promised on Saturday that he would not place sensitive issues up for debate in parliament, but in coalition talks instead, provided that the CDA made clear it was looking towards a CDA, PvdA and SP coalition government.

The conflict has cast a heavy shadow over the coalition formation. PvdA and the Socialist SP are demanding that Balkenende publicly state that the CDA will enter into coalition talks with the two left-wing parties.

But Balkenende failed to do so after his Saturday meeting with informateur Jan Rein Hoekstra, who is in charge of the coalition formation talks.

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Tolerance has won; or has it?

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. . . with the long-awaited re-emergence of Dutch tolerance finally in sight, these 12,000 people are caught in the cross-fire of a new political dogfight.

Their fate will largely decide the nation's future government.

The Socialist SP — the big winner from last month's national elections — and the Labour PvdA are demanding that they be granted a residence permit via a general amnesty.

In the opposite corner is the ruling Christian Democrat CDA, which emerged largely unscathed from the elections to remain the nation's largest party and is compelled to finish the work of its coalition partner VVD and deport those families out of the country.

In doing so, the CDA risks alienating those who voted (en masse) for change last month and further dividing the nation rather than offering itself as the bridge: a bridge to cross the divide between the anti-immigrant far-right and the pro-amnesty far-left.

Hand in hand with the VVD, the CDA has waged a crackdown on immigration in the past few years and now that the goal posts have moved, it is seeking to score after the whistle has blown, concerned that an amnesty will only attract more asylum seekers to the country.

When it first came to power, the CDA-VVD coalition government (along with its third partner, the Democrat D66) was confronted with the looming 2003 recession, a threatened flood of new EU workers, overcrowding fears, terrorism and social polarisation.

It took up what the ill-fated Pim Fortuyn sloganised: that the nation was 'full' and immigrants had to integrate into Dutch society.

Compulsory Dutch language and culture lessons were imposed on new arrivals, minimum wage and age requirements raised to restrict family migration and a decision taken to deport 26,000 asylum seekers, some of whom had been here 12 years and whose children did not speak the language of the violence-torn countries they were being deported 'back' to.

And in a post-9/11 world full of terrorism fears, the public bought it, lock, stock and barrel. Close the borders, they yelled.

But times have changed. The economy improved, higher emigration rates eased fears of overcrowding, integration classes became accepted, new EU workers became economically attractive and the D66 abandoned the government in an immigration row with Verdonk over her treatment of Somali-born asylum seeker and Dutch MP Ayaan Hirsi Ali.

The government collapsed and as the nation grew tired of the whole anti-immigration debate, the fate of those 26,000 asylum seekers returned to haunt the nation.

And though their numbers have dwindled to 12,000 people, a large swathe of Dutch voters is now finally asking the same question: Why in heaven's name kick them out?

Because in the meantime, these 26,000 people have gained an identity.

From the initial protest campaign '26,000 faces' to the haunting images of the man who sewed his eyes and lips together during a 2004 protest in The Hague, the group of asylum seekers have been recognised as members of local communities.

They have become known as families trying to make homes in the Netherlands, families who have had children here, work and pay taxes, who have integrated and are contributing to society.

The association of Dutch municipalities VNG echoed the public's outcry and local communities banded together to say no: don't take our neighbours away.

This shift of public opinion and the re-emergence of a Dutch 'social conscience' led to a dynamic shift in the balance of power.

The 75-74 vote in the 150-seat Dutch Parliament last week urging the government to stop the expulsions until a general amnesty can be legislated is a clear indication that the government has been outgunned.

Instead of accepting this, it is widely expected that the coalition CDA-VVD caretaker cabinet will defy the parliament and proceed with expulsions. That message will be delayed by letter on Tuesday.

It will be a direct affront to the PvdA and SP, a message of: 'You're not in government yet'. It is a high-stakes political battle against a backdrop of coalition talks to determine the make-up of the new government.

And yet, caught in the middle are 12,000 asylum seekers holding their breath, hoping for a dream.

But now, they've finally got a parliament majority on their side.

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[ 05 December 2006: Message edited by: Wilf Day ]

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No, the six left-wing parties have a 76/74 majority. (Not sure why Thursday's vote was only 75/74, perhaps the new Speaker was from Labour.) The assumption was that a six-party coalition would be too fragile, with three MPs from the centre-left "Democrats 66", two from the new "Party for Animals" and six from the Christen Unie (Calvinist and morally conservative but economically leftist.)

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Originally posted by Stockholm:
I'm not sure that you can ever use "left-wing" and "Calvinist" in the same sentence.

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Originally posted by Stockholm:
so they are progressive on one issue and reactionary on 100 others?

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Originally posted by Stockholm:
it might be a lot simpler to put together a three party CDA, PvdA and SP coalition since only three parties have to be involved than it is to put together a six party government where all six parties have to be brought in and all have various sacred cows etc...

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Originally posted by Stockholm:
The CDA in the Netherlands is like the Liberal Party of Canada. They are a middle of the road party . . .

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[ 06 December 2006: Message edited by: Wilf Day ]

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The SP also indicated on Sunday it was in favour of entering government, but on the condition that the CDA gave various policy concessions.

CDA leader Balkenende displayed little interest in a coalition with the SP last week due to large differences in policies.

He was also reticent about entering into a coalition in which the left-wing would form a majority.

Labour leader Bos is still intent on a coalition between the three parties, stressing that the SP should enter government because it was the big winner from last month's elections.

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Labour leader Wouter Bos said he was very disappointed. Marijnissen had missed a 'golden opportunity,' he said. 'This was the only chance for the SP to form a strong left-wing block in a majority coalition. To walk away before we got down to serious negotiations is the easy way out.'

'I am critical about everything Balkenende is proud of,' SP leader Jan Marijnissen says in today's Volkskrant.

Among the issues which divided the SP and CDA were the EU, Dutch involvement in Afghanistan, income policy, international alliances, defence spending and corporate taxation.

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Many analysts believe that the most likely solution is a coalition between Balkenende's Christian Democrats, Labor and a small, centrist party such as the left-leaning Christian Union. Together those parties would have 80 seats in Parliament.

The failure of coalition talks with the Socialists leaves Balkenende with few options. Although his center-right Christian Democrats are the largest party, parties on the left have a two-seat majority in parliament, and few would be willing to work with parties on the right wing.

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A slim majority (53%) of Labour voters do not want their party to take part in a coalition which excludes the SP, according to a poll by Maurice de Hond on Tuesday. But 77% of CDA voters said there was no point in continuing talks with the SP, the poll said.

The pull-out of the SP means Hoekstra must now try to piece together a new coalition. Orthodox religious party ChristenUnie - which is left-leaning on some issues - is the next logical choice of coalition partner. But its opposition to abortion, euthanasia and gay marriage may also prove a stumbling block. The left-wing greens GroenLinks are another candidate.

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But will Labour voters accept this?

How about a six-party all-left coalition? Pretty rare, even in a Europe that is used to making coalitions work. The only example that comes to mind is Ireland in 1948:

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The Dáil had been expanded to 147 seats; Fianna Fáil won 68 seats (including the outgoing speaker); Fine Gael 31; Labour 14; Clann na Poblachta (a new left party) 10; Clann na Talmhan (farmers) 7; National Labour 5; and independents 12. Astonishingly, a coalition of everyone-except-Fianna-Fáil was constructed, with the new Taoiseach John A. Costello putting an end to sixteen years of Fianna Fáil rule. However the Inter-Party Government disintegrated three years later in a Church/State row over health provision.

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[ 12 December 2006: Message edited by: Wilf Day ]