Explain Dutch politics to me

[Zinneke]

Pillarization sounds like the future of the US, based entirely on ideology. It's already apparent with the ranting about people's social media bubbles, or how just about how news sources today are quite ideologically biased, growing regional polarization, etc.

Its a concept probably specific to the Lowlands due to their struggle in building nationhood as a social and political identity. Its pretty much all but gone in NL. Here our healthcare for example is still pillarised but the private sector insurance/mutuality companies fill the same role. The Trade Unions are pillarised (we have a liberal trade union, which does't make sense in European political terminology) but the Universities, political parties and newspapers aren't any more.

The Netherlands probably de-pillarised the most due to the Wim Kok years, although David will know more about that than me.

What is going on in the US is more to do with societal fragmentation. You guys already had modern nationhood long before this started as far as I can tell.

[Zinneke]

Pillarization sounds like the future of the US, based entirely on ideology. It's already apparent with the ranting about people's social media bubbles, or how just about how news sources today are quite ideologically biased, growing regional polarization, etc.

Its a concept probably specific to the Lowlands due to their struggle in building nationhood as a social and political identity. Its pretty much all but gone in NL. Here our healthcare for example is still pillarised but the private sector insurance/mutuality companies fill the same role. The Trade Unions are pillarised (we have a liberal trade union, which does't make sense in European political terminology) but the Universities, political parties and newspapers aren't any more.

The Netherlands probably de-pillarised the most due to the Wim Kok years, although David will know more about that than me.

What is going on in the US is more to do with societal fragmentation. You guys already had modern nationhood long before this started as far as I can tell.

So how did that work? Was there some sort of natural sorting to ensure Catholics, or Socialists or whatever wound up employed by an employer who negotiated with the appropriate union?

Well, there is some evidence of corruption, but its more subtle than that. For example, Claude Moniquet wrote in his ''Black Book of Belgium'' that to fulfill certain pillared-influenced quotas, a prospective employee would be asked : do you believe in democracy? do you believe in freedom? If he answered yes both he was officially a Liberal, even though the employee was a socialist. he was told to register as a Liberal to fulfill the Liberal quota. This mainly happened in the public sector but the gap between the private and public sector in Belgium is very small. its little things like that that make Belgium a bit surreal.

Nowadays, the unions are still just organised according to the old pillars.