The last Social-Democrat standing has now fallen over?! Eberhard van der Laan and the apparent superfluousness of modern Social-Democracy in the current Conservative Wave

“The greatest trick the Conservatives ever pulled,

is convincing the lower classes in society they don’t

need social-democrat parties anymore”

Paraphrase, inspired by Verbal Kint/Keyser Söze of “The Usual Suspects”

Last week, the lately retired mayor of Dutch capital Amsterdam, Eberhard van der Laan, died of disseminated lung cancer amid his beloved family.

Mayor Van der Laan, who was also Minister for Housing and Integration in the fourth Cabinet of Jan Peter Balkenende (2007 – 2010), left his beloved city Amsterdam in grief, shock and awe after his expected, but yet untimely death.

Van der Laan, an intelligent, extremely driven and cunning former attorney was every inch a social-democrat: a person who had a great compassion for other people and put his own personal wealth at second place, after the prosperity and wellbeing of others.

Especially the ones who had not been so lucky in life and threatened to end up at the wrong end of the line, got his personal attention and energy. This was under the premise that they wanted to improve their own situation and were willing to put their own energy in it. But Van der Laan was not a wimp, who believed every sad story he heard and who saw every poor or criminal person as a victim of circumstances.

He was an extremely hard worker, who also demanded this from the people around him. Therefore he could be impatient, sometimes quite direct and even rude and tough regarding his personnel, as well as on other people. Especially people who did not work hard enough to his eyes.

On the other hand, he never forgot his compassion with the people in need.He demanded serious efforts from the needy to pull themselves out of the moor, but made sure that they got all the tools they needed to achieve this; a real helping hand for everybody who needed that. And he took the helm whenever the situation desired that and was effortless in solving the big problems, when they emerged. All these features together made him arguably the most beloved mayor of Amsterdam ever.  

This was the reason that the emerging stories about his debilitating and lethal sickness as of February 2017 and eventually his death caused so much grief among the citizens of Amsterdam.

At about the same time last week, the current PM of The Netherlands Mark Rutte (liberal-conservative party VVD) finalized the construction of his new, four-party Cabinet, together with CDA (Christian-Democrat party), D66 (liberal-progressive party) and ChristenUnie (Christian party).

And to make clear for which this new Christian-Liberal-Conservative cabinet would stand, the Dutch newspapers stood full of (leaked) news messages about tax reduction and tax shifts:

• Substantially lowered corporate taxes (to 21% from 25%) for large companies;
• Reduced income and corporate taxes for small and medium enterprises;
• Lowered wealth and income taxes for the mid and especially higher incomes;
• ... and last, but not least, increased Value Added Taxes on basic food supplies (to 9% from 6%).

Summarizing, these are almost all measures from which the mid and higher incomes and the large companies will benefit most, while lower incomes have to deal with increased prices for basic food supplies. These increased expenses for food all add up to a lion share of the monthly income for the people with lower wages and those who live on welfare.

A really puzzling question, that is put forward by especially this upcoming tax reduction for (large, multinational) companies, is: what is the need for it?! In other words: why would these companies, who already make sturdy profits at the moment, have to be tickled some more through these tax reductions? What is it good for?!

The large, listed corporations and financial institutions are not exactly in dire straits at the moment and are not in desperate need of getting more working capital. To the contrary: the influx of money is almost reaching the ceiling of most large companies, banks and investment vehicles in this economic bull-market. This is reflected in the gargantuous merger and acquisistion deals that are currently taking place all over the world, as well as in the arguably overrated shares on many stock exchanges.

And the same is true for the wealthiest people in The Netherlands, which profit most from the new, reduced tax rates. They are not exactly doing poorly at the moment, aren’t they?! So why should these well-to-do people need tax rate cuts anyway?!

Why – for crying out loud – would the new cabinet Mark Rutte III give yet another tax cutback for these corporations and for the wealthiest people in The Netherlands, when they evidently don’t need it at all? Everybody and their sister know that the mounting inequality between the lower and higher societal classes and the enormous differences in wealth are yet problematic phenomena. And on top of this, these effects are getting bigger and bigger, irrespective of these new rate cuts! The rate cuts only reinforce these phenomena, which are devastating for the societal cohesion and solidarity between the different classes.

And perhaps the most puzzling question of them all: why are the really poor people and the people with lower incomes in the EU countries massively abandoning the social-democrat parties, instead of letting them win elections?

First and foremost the social-democrats are supposed to operate mostly in the interest of the lower class people. Yet, they are abandoned in favour of the (liberal-)conservative parties and the extreme right-wing nationalist parties all over Europe.

How can it be explained that Christian / Liberal / Conservative parties can form a workable majority in most European parliaments, while the social-democrats are convicted to yet another number of years at the sidelines, due to having yet again too little votes.

See for instance The Netherlands were the labour party (i.e. PvdA ) was virtually annihilated, with a seat loss of almost 30 seats.

Or look at Germany where the social-democrat party SPD of Martin Schulz was beaten up badly by past and future Chancellor Angela Merkel of the Christian-Democrat CDU. Or Poland and Hungary where religiously driven, authoritarian ultra-conservatives are introducing ‘grandfather’s  reactionary policies’ as an answer to the challenges of the 21st Century .

Or look at the UK, where the accident-prone Prime Minister Theresa ‘Butterfingers’ May could continue her pro-Brexit collision course against the EU, until the UK ends up in economic oblivion and much more starts to drop down than only the ‘F’ in the word ‘for’.  And knowing that her main adversary within the Tory party is the pathological liar and political clown Boris Johnson, whose stint as Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs made a lasting impression for all the wrong reasons.

Or see France where Président Emmanuel Macron could start with his liberal-conservative policy 2.0, trailed by the right-wing Front National of ‘daughter of’ Marine Le Pen.

And last, but not least: look at Spain, where conservative PM Rajoy knows nothing better to do than beating all plans for an independency referendum out of the skulls of the Catalunyan citizens, with brutal force.

To paraphrase anti-hero Verbal Kint (i.e. Keyser Söze ) in the magical film The Usual Suspects: “The greatest trick the Conservatives ever pulled is convincing the lower classes in society they don’t need social-democrat parties anymore!”.

That is the most worrisome conclusion of the current political situation: in times in which vivid, empathic and sensible social-democrat policies are needed more than ever to reduce the mounting differences between the rich and the poor in the European societies, the social-democrats are annihilated and even ridiculized by the other, mostly conservative and extreme right-wing parties.

Does this mean that social-democracy is dead and buried nowadays?! Will it never have the chance to emerge from the ashes anymore, like a phoenix?  Have the spirits of ‘a fair share of the pie for everybody’ gone foregood?! I don’t think so!!!

I happen to think that it IS the end of the line for the so-called “social-democrats-in-name-only” that nowadays still flock the European parliaments and government buildings. People that appear to be social-democrat, but in reality are societally detached, technocrat apparatchiks, housing in their ivory towers. These are indeed superfluous and well beyond their expiration date.

People, like former British PM’s Tony Blair and Gordon Brown, labour leaders Diederik Samsom and Lodewijk Asscher in The Netherlands or social-democrat powerhouse Martin Schulz in Germany.

People that perhaps started with the right ideas and the right energy, but who are now so deeply seized by the temptations of the makeable society, their governmental position and current power, that they forgot for whom and whose interests they are working in the first place.  People who are simply too attached to the privileges and power that came with their position.

On the other hand, it is also the end of the line for the hardened proto-socialists like Jeremy Corbyn and their “marxist” dreams of total division of wealth and the “socialist Workers International”. They are all well past their expiration date too, in my humble opinion, as their ideas are so far removed from the questions and conundrums of the current society, that they are not at all able to answer these questions and solve these conundrums and stick to overdue frames and visions that are not feasible anymore.

But does that mean that the concept of social-democracy itself has passed away?!

I get a glimmer of hope from the widespread public grief and endless respect and compassion that accompanied the passing away of “Burgemeester” Van der Laan of Amsterdam.

First and foremost Van der Laan was a tough and compassionate social-democrat by heart. His death proved beyond a reasonable doubt  that people in the street are still moved by leaders with a good heart and a strong will, who are willing to fight for a just cause. Hence, the widespread public grief after Van der Laan’s passing or the countless tokens of appreciation and love for this ‘tough guy’ during his prolonged period of sickness and deteriorating health.

Van der Laan was a man who exposed many of the mainly ‘self-interested’ and (corporate) wealth-oriented liberal-conservatives as the bleak, egocentrical and clueless people-without-a-vision-towards-a-better-world that they are. People, who think that introducing an increased speed limit for gasoline-operated cars (to 130kmh from 120 kmh) is a good thing for the environment and who live by the adage “apres nous le déluge”(i.e. after us the tidal flood).

Sadly Van der Laan has passed away now, but his legacy is nevertheless that a genuine social-democrat is still able to change things for the better: one step at the time, but always persevering. Let’s keep heed of this invaluable legacy and let’s breed a new generation of genuine social-democrats!

He was definitely not a saint, but a man with genuine convictions and with a real plan for the people in need, who deserves successors all over Europe. In spite of the current bad reputation of social-democracy.