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Template:Infobox Ethnic group beta

The Dutch people (Dutch: Nederlanders. Literal translation: 'Lowlanders') are an ethnic group who form the majority of the population in the Netherlands (13 million in 2006). The Dutch mainly descend from various Germanic tribes, and are hence regarded to be a Germanic people.

Today the term can have different meanings depending on context and definition. The number of (ethnic) Dutch people today for example can range from 13,000,000 to 25,000,000 or even 30,000,000 depending on context. Historically the Dutch chiefly lived in the Low Countries and Northern France but since the 12th century they have spread all over the world.

Terminology

The Term"Dutch" when referring to people can refer to the entire population of the Netherlands, to those with Dutch nationality and citizenship (essentially the same under Dutch law), to a Dutch nation, or to an ethnic group. The ethnic Dutch are those who have full or partial Dutch ancestry. In the Netherlands, the term "ethnic group" is an academic one, the standard term in general use is volk, which, depending on context, both national and ethnic connotations.

In the Netherlands (and Flanders), the term "allochtoon" is widely used to refer to immigrants and their descendants. Officially the term allochtoon is much more specific and refers to anyone of whom one or both of his/her parents was not born in the Netherlands. Hence, third generation immigrants, are no longer considered allochtoon (if both their parents were born in the Netherlands). The corresponding antonym autochtoon is less widely used, but it generally corresponds to ethnic Dutch.

Whether the 'allochtones' are treated as part of the Dutch people depends largely on context. Similarly, the Frisians may or may not be included in the Dutch people, according to context and intention. Frisian may refer to an ethnic group, a regional or cultural identity, to inhabitants of the Province of Friesland, or to speakers of the Frisian language. The Kingdom of the Netherlands includes Caribbean islands with an ethnically distinct population, and they may or may not be included in the term "Nederlanders". In nationality law, the term Nederlander denotes a citizen of the Kingdom of the Netherlands, and also includes persons with clearly non-Dutch ethnicity.

Outside the Netherlands

Outside the Netherlands, the English-language exonym Dutch also refers to people who descend from the Dutch, or at least from emigrants from the present territory of the Netherlands. The corresponding endonym "Nederlanders" is used in the Netherlands itself to indicate the Dutch as an ethnic group, but it can also refer to the entire population of the Netherlands, depending on the context.

This multiple meaning of the word Dutch is inevitably used in this article as well. When reading the article, the most common meanings of Dutch refer to the period after the rise of the nation states in the late 19th; early 20th century "Dutch" refers to the Dutch-speaking ethnic group native to the country of the Netherlands. More or less the same problem goes for the term the "Netherlands" which may mean both the current country and the group of related provinces. In Dutch; this distinction is more easily made as the current country is referred to as Nederland' (singular) while a reference to the (Low Countries) is made by Nederlanden (plural). English however, does not provide such a distinction, and the difference can only be made clear by the context.

Total numbers

About 11,5 million people outside of the Netherlands consider themselves to have a considerable degree of Dutch herritage or ancestry and can hence be considered part of the Dutch ethnic group as they feel culturally connected. However according to the official definition third and later generation emmigrants are considered allochtoon. Hence there is somewhat of a gap between the "legally Dutch" and the people culturally attached to the Dutch.

In the 1950s (the peak of Dutch emigration) about 350 000 people left the Netherlands, mainly to Australia, New Zealand, Canada, the United States and South Africa. About one-fifth returned. Like in most western European countries, the 1960s were marked by the start of immigration. Since 1960 4,2 million immigrants entered the country. About one-quarter were returning Dutch migrants. This is half of the total 6,5 million emigrants since 1865. People belonging to this wave of Dutch immigrants generally have the closest ties to the Dutch today, and many would still be considered ethnic Dutch.

Closely related ethnic groups

Flemings

The relation between the Dutch and Flemings is a complicated one. Historically the modern Dutch and the people now known as Flemings were considered one people. The existence of "Flemings" as an ethnic group, is itself debated, and the idea of a Flemish nation or ethnic group is itself fairly recent.

Perhaps ironically, the Flemish movement was caused by the Belgian government which, following the Belgian Revolution and the subsequent Dutch invasion, had a clear anti-Dutch policy.

From 1830 (the start of the revolution) till 1873, the Dutch language was unrecognised, even though the majority of Belgium’s inhabitants spoke it. In 1873 the two languages were proclaimed equal but effectively French was still more dominant and important. In 1914, during the First World War, the Dutch-speaking Belgian soldiers received orders in French. This would later indirectly establish the IJzerbedevaart, a memorial to all the "Flemish" soldiers who fought in the Great War, now largely a gathering of Flemish nationalists.

Linguistically the dialects of Dutch spoken in Belgium are all cross-border dialects which means that these dialects are also spoken in the Netherlands. When observing religion Flanders, despite the fact that in the 16th century Protestantism first arrived in the Low Countries in Western Flanders, is almost completely Catholic. Many Flemings hold to the stereotype that the Dutch, opposed to themselves, are mostly Protestants. However this is incorrect. The southern parts of the Netherlands are, and always were, overwhelmingly catholic. Catholicism itself is the largest religion in the Netherlands today.

The main difference between the modern Dutch and Flemings is their political development and situation since the Belgian Revolt. There was little political contact between the Dutch and Belgian governments until the Second World War. The Dutch are never experienced the oppression of their language, or had to live with a second large ethnic group. Currently the ratio between the Dutch and the second largest ethnic group is 33 to 1, in Belgium it's 1,8 to 1. Historically this meant that the Flemings experienced a great deal of ethnic/cultural awareness, while being separated from their closest related group of people. As a result of this the Flemish people are generally not regarded as identical nowadays, and most Dutch people see them as a separate ethnic group. At the same time however, the Dutch and Flemish see themselves as the closest related people, and some institutions see "Fleming" as an alternative term for "Dutch".

Some people even support a re-unification of Flanders and the Netherlands, though they form a minority; it is not a political issue in the Netherlands and the sentiment is strongest within the right wing of Flemish politics.

Afrikaners

The Afrikaners are an South African and Namibian ethnic group mainly (though not exclusively) originating from Dutch immigrants, much in the same way as Dutch Americans, Dutch Australians or Dutch Canadians do. There is however one major difference. The Dutch emigrants and, more importantly, their decendants in Canada, the U.S and Australia, have adopted English as their first language, while Afrikaners speak a creolized version of the Dutch language. Their language, Afrikaans, is mutually inteligeble with Dutch and it was hence easier to maintain cultural bands between the two, now separate, groups.

Until the early 20th century, at the time of the Boer Wars, there was a strong sense of unity, this has gradually faded. Most Afrikaners acknowledge that they (predominantly) descend from Dutch people, but they generally do not consider themselves to only be ethnic Dutch, and they may not be considered 'Dutch' in the Netherlands itself.

Frisians

Frisia was a county that was relatively uninvoled with Guelders, Utrecht, Holland, Zeeland and Flanders until the early middle ages. However, after a series of wars (often followed by revolts) between the Dutch fiefs and the Frisians they were eventually defeated. From the 1400s onwards Hollandic government and civil servants were installed and from then the fortunes of Friesland are intertwined with those of the present-day Netherlands.

Though many Frisians speak the Frisian language, which is not a Dutch dialect but a historically separate language and have (to some degree) a separate culture they are not treated as a separate group in Dutch official statistics. In this way Frisians can both be Ethnic Dutch as well as Ethnic Frisians.

History

The history of the Dutch, as of most European peoples, is complex and intertwined through migrations and shifting empires. In this section, a short overview of these issues in relation to the approximate area of the current Netherlands is sketched (note that this area includes the Lowlands which included Flanders and Artois; which is now part of France).

After the Romans extended their empire to the Rhine river, the area was partially occupied by the Romans. After the fall of the Roman Empire, the Netherlands were ruled by Germanic chieftains. The emerging power of the Franks brought the area under the rule of the Merovingian kings, and the area was part of Charlemagnes empire (app. 800CE). In the following period the Lowlands became part of the Holy Roman Empire. With the decline of the centralised power in the early medieval period the Low Lands became de-facto ruled by local nobility: counts, dukes and bishops. During the late medieval expansion of the Burgundian Empire the Low Lands were incorporated. After the Pragmatic Sanction of 1549, Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor established the Lowlands as a politcal entity that wasspearated from the Holy Roman Empire and the French crown. The 17 Netherlands became part of the Hapsburg inheritance of Charles and came to resort under the crown of Spain when his son Philip II succeeded him. In the early stages of the Dutch revolt the supporters of the Spanish crown joined in the Union of Arras, while the mainly Northern Dutch opponents joined in the union of Utrecht. The members of the Union of Utrecht renounced the king of Spain as their monarch after which they tried to find a new monarch at first. When no European monarch would risk outright adversity of the king of Spain, it was decided the new form of government would be a republic. The Dutch republic was in fact a confederation of Dutch states and was led by their representatives, the Grand Pensionary and the Stadholder. Officially each province had its own Grand Pensionary and Stadtholder, however, in practice the Grand Pensionary of the county of Holland was the political leader of the Dutch Republic. Where stadtholders could be appointed separately, and many of the same Stadholders were appointed to many, if not all provinces. Futhermore, all appointments were made in the Nassau family (relatives of William of Orange), making this in practice a hereditary position. Where the Grand Pensionary of Holland was the political leader, the Stadtholder of Holland acted as the Dutch supreme military commander. The hereditary Stadholder dynasty was accumulating wealth and power; which stressed the relation with the civil rulers. This dualistic system was eventually overthrown in the Batavian Revolution, inspired by the French revolution. Patriotic revolutionaries denounced the political role of the Stadtholder and established the Batavian Republic. The Stadtholder fled to the United Kingdom. The Batavian Republic was a more centralised unitary state, instead of the previous loose confederation of (at least nominally) independent provinces; it may be argued that with the advent of the Batavian republic for the first time ever one can speak of a single Dutch people, rather than a group of Dutch peoples. In reality the Batavian Republic was never much more than a vassal state of France. With the rise of Napoleon the Netherlands were eventually annexed into the French Empire for a period of 3 years. After the defeat of Napoleon, the Dutch state was turned into a monarchy by the allied powers. The son of the last stadtholder was installed as King with almost absolutist powers. However, renewed unrest all over Europe worried the Dutch King and at he voluntarily accepted a change in the governmental structure of the Netherlands into its current form of a constitutional monarchy.

In 1950, Dutch descent, Dutch nationality, and Dutch citizenship were in practice identical. The Netherlands was largely a mono-ethnic society (if the Frisians are considered part of the Dutch ethnic group). In 1950, most Dutch were either Catholic or Protestant; with a few atheists. The Netherlands had been exposed to many ethnic influences, however, as colonial influences had been present for a long time. Decolonisation and immigrant workers in the 1960's resulted in much immigration. For example, currently 900,000 inhabitants count the Islam as their religion. More openly shown problems in the integration of the existing culture with these immigrants has made the 'ethnicity' and national identity of the Dutch a political issue.

Influence on the world

Although comparatively small in numbers, the Dutch have definitely made their mark on the world, as we know it today. The Dutch Republic was an economic and military power during much of the 17th century, and involved in many conflicts of the time, such as the Anglo-Dutch Wars.The economy was carried by private enterprises, for the first time on that scale and the Dutch East India Company issued the first freely tradable stock, one of the cornerstones of modern economy.

Dutch colonialism still influences the lives of many today. Beginning in the sixteenth century, Europeans such as the Dutch began to establish trading posts and forts along the coasts of western and southern Africa. Eventually, a large number of Dutch, augmented by French Huguenots and Germans, settled in the Cape Colony. Their descendants in South Africa, the Afrikaners and the Coloureds, are the largest European-descended groups in Africa today, see Demographics of Africa. The Dutch also controlled what is now known as Indonesia, and waged various wars against its native inhabitants in a series conflicts raging from the early 16th to the late 20th century. The area surrounding New York was a Dutch colony and in fact many street names and geographical locations still bear Dutch (though Anglicised) names, see Legacy of the Dutch in New York for more information.

The Dutch in Asia

The Dutch have had a profound effect on the developement of Asia, particulary South East Asia, Taiwan and Japan. In many cases the Dutch were often the first Europeans the natives would encounter. As a result there has been some considerable ethnic stereotyping. The Japanese described the Dutch as red-haired barbarians and in Malay the name for the Long-nosed Monkey litterally translated means "Dutchman".

Japan

From the 1630s to the middle of the nineteenth century, Japan was closed to foreigners. The only Westerners allowed to stay in Japan and engage in trade were the Dutch. They had to submit to very strict regulations, however, and were only allowed to live on Deshima, a small artificial island in Nagasaki harbor. Numerous (now extremely rare) pictures depicting Dutch traders in Nagasaki were made. At the time of their publication the prints were sold as souvenirs to Japanese who visited Nagasaki and hoped to catch a glimpse of these strange "red-haired barbarians".

Taiwan

Dutch traders, in search of an Asian base first claimed Formosa (Taiwan) in 1624 as a base for Dutch commerce with Japan and the coast of China. Two years later, the Spanish established a settlement at Santissima Trinidad building Fort Santo Domingo on the northwest coast of Taiwan near Keelung, which they occupied until 1642 when they were driven out by the Dutch. The Dutch East India Company (VOC) administered the island and its predominantly aboriginal population until 1662, setting up a tax system, schools to teach romanized script of aboriginal languages, the Sinckan writing, and also evangelizing. Although its control was mainly limited to the southwest and north of the island, the Dutch systems were adopted by succeeding occupiers.

Indonesia

The history of the Dutch in what is now Indonesia is less peaceful. Beginning in 1602 the Dutch started to establish themselves as rulers of what is now Indonesia, exploiting the fractionalisation of the small kingdoms that had replaced Majapahit. The Dutch used a policy of divide and rule amongst the different ethnic groups and kingdoms of Indonesia and subsequently attacked the weak.

The primary Dutch aim was to create and maintain a monopoly of the spice trade in the archipelago. It did this through the use and threatened use of violence against the peoples of the spice-producing islands, and against non-Dutch outsiders who attempted to trade with them. For example, when the people of the Banda Islands continued to sell nutmeg to English merchants, the Dutch killed or deported virtually the entire population and repopulated the islands with indentured servants and slaves who worked in the nutmeg groves.

Dutch diaspora

Emigrants from the Netherlands since the Second World War went mainly to Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and until the 1970's to South Africa, and Dutch immigrants can be found in most developed countries. In several former Dutch colonies and trading settlements, there are ethnic groups of partial Dutch ancestry.

Contribution to humanity

A significant number of painters and philosophers are Dutch, despite its small population. Remarkable persons include painters like Van Gogh, Rembrandt and Vermeer, and philosophers like Spinoza, Erasmus of Rotterdam and Hugo Grotius as well as various poets and writers such as Pieter Hooft, Joost van den Vondel and Anne Frank and scientists like Christiaan Huygens also made their mark on how we today view the world. The Netherlands were arguably the first nation state of the world and the first republic in modern Europe. During the early 17th century, the economic reforms, empire and ideas made the Netherlands one of the world's richest countries and the first thoroughly capitalistic country.

Genetics and appearance

The Dutch descend from a group of Homo sapiens who settled in Europe during the Paleolithic and Neolithic eras. These people originated in what is now the Middle East and brought with them a distinct set of Y chromosomal and mitochondrial haplotypes as well as Indo-European languages, agriculture and pottery. Hence the Dutch share a lot of their genetics with other European people, nevertheless there are some mutations that arose among the Dutch. The percentages of hair colour for the Dutch population are 43% brown, and 40% blonde hair and 17% other (note that this includes non-western ethnic minorities so the actual percentages of blond or brown hair for the Dutch ethnic group are likely to be higher) Generally the Dutch are described as being very tall, and they are indeed the tallest people on earth, but this is a relatively recent development. It was only in the 1950s that the Dutch passed Americans, who stood tallest for most of the last 200 years. In fact, in 1848, one man out of four was rejected by the Dutch military because he was shorter than 5-foot-2 (about 155 cm).

Culture and identity

Dutch culture is diverse, reflecting regional differences as well as foreign influences thanks to the merchant and exploring spirit of the Dutch. The Netherlands and Dutch people have played an important role for centuries as a cultural center, with the Dutch Golden Age regarded as the zenith. During the 20th century Dutch architects played a leading role in the development of modern architecture, and Dutch painters like Rembrandt and Van Gogh are world renowned.

The Dutch people and their culture were historically influenced by the culture of neighbouring regions. France played a substantial role in the history of the Netherlands in the 17th, 18th and early 19th centuries, and there are resulting cultural influences. Cultural contacts with Scandinavia were, and are, much less influential. English-speaking cultural influences are predominant since the Second World war. The Dutch also were influenced by their colonies, most notably Indonesia.

The Dutch and the Flemish share the same language: Dutch. The present state border between the Netherlands and the Flemish part of Belgium does not coincide with any linguistic or dialectal boundary. In the Province of Limburg, the Netherlands border with Wallonia coincides, in places, with the Dutch-French linguistic boundary.

After the Dutch Revolt and the Peace of Westphalia, the Dutch and Flemings (who live in Northern Belgium) were not generally seen as one single people or nation, despite the unification during the United Kingdom of the Netherlands. Nevertheless they share a sense of being closely related, as the only two Dutch-speaking societies in Europe. They share a language and have a similar culture in some respects. There are some differences. Although Protestantism first arrived in the Low Countries in Western Flanders, due to Spanish control Calvinism had almost no lasting influence in Flanders, which remained overwhelmingly Catholic, just like the Southern part of the modern Netherlands which experienced a similar occupation.

The Belgian revolution, domination by a Francophone elite, and structural disadvantage for Dutch-speaking Belgians, led at the end of the 19th century to an oppositional Flemish cultural movement, which soon politicised. It revived interest in the idea of reunification - at present in the form of unity between the Netherlands and Flanders, rather than a recreation of the United Kingdom of the Netherlands. Support for the idea has varied: at present no political party represented in the Dutch parliament actively supports it. (In Flanders, the supporters of the idea are found mainly among Flemish separatists. The main separatist party, Vlaams Belang, generally seen as belonging to the extreme right, supports an independent Flanders).

Support for the break-up of Belgium is less strong in Wallonia, as Flanders financially much stronger and independant, and there is no major political support there for unification with France. An obstacle to any break-up of Belgium is that both groups claim the capital Brussels, historically a Dutch-speaking and culturally Flemish city, currently near 80% Francophone, although officially bilingual.

The Frisian people, who speak their own language and today live mainly in Friesland (a province of the Netherlands), have had some influence on Dutch culture, especially in the northern parts of the province of North Holland proper; also named West Frisia.

Religion

Also see: History of religion in the Netherlands

The Dutch population can be separated into two main religious groups: Roman Catholics and Protestants. During and after the Dutch revolt against Spain, Protestantism became the dominant religion in most of the country. The provinces of North Brabant and Limburg and the region of Twente, however, remained predominantly Catholic.

At 30 percent of the population, Catholics form the largest religious group today. Meanwhile, the Dutch belong to many separate Protestant churches, the largest of which are the Dutch Reformed Church (Nederlands Hervormd) and the Reformed Churches in the Netherlands (Gereformeerd), although in 2004 these merged to form the Protestant Church in the Netherlands.

During the late 19th and early 20th centuries the different religious groups were living completely separately from each other, and from the newly emerging socialist labour movement. These sub-societies were a form of horizontal stratification: people lived and married within their own communities, and the pillars had their own schools and universities, media (newspapers, magazines and radio broadcasting associations), sport clubs, shops, hospitals, unions and political parties. This intense social fragmentation was called verzuiling and led to significant tension within Dutch political life. Pillarisation is described in detail in Arend Lijphart's seminal work on consociationalism, The Politics of Accommodation.

After peaking in influence in the 1950s, the social system of pillarisation started to crumble in the early 1960s during the Dutch postmaterialist revolution, due to secularisation, individualism, consumerism, counter-culture, rising living standards, the emergence of mass media (especially television), increased social and geographical mobility, and agitation by movements such as Provo, D66 and Nieuw Links.

A 2004 study conducted by Statistics Netherlands shows that 50% of the population claim to belong to a Christian denomination, 9% to other denominations and 42% to none. In the same study 19% of the people claim go to church at least once a month, another 9% less than once a month, 72% hardly ever or never. There is a small Jewish community, mostly in the larger cities. The only religion that has been growing in recent decades is Islam. This is mostly in areas where Turkish and Moroccan immigrant communities have formed.

People of Dutch ancestry in the United States are generally more religious than their European counterparts ; the numerous Dutch communities of western Michigan remain strongholds of the Reformed Church in America, a descendant of the Dutch Reformed Church.

Choice of leadership

The Dutch have seen many forms of government over the centuries. In pre-christian times the (future) Dutch were led by Germanic chieftains who were both political and religious leaders. The chieftains were chosen, and could equally be deposed of. During the Late Antiquity and the Early Middle Ages the concept of Germanic Kings appeared. The Low Countries were ruled by Frankish kings from 370 until 929, when Lotharingia (the middle Frankish Kingdom) was integrated into the Eastern Frankish Kingdom and thereby also into the Holy Roman Empire. Subsequently the Dutch now answered to the East Frankish and later German King, which continued until the Dutch revolt. Although the Dutch tried to find a new monarch at first, it was later decided the new form of government would be a republic. The Dutch republic was in fact a confederation of Dutch states and was led by their representatives, the Grand Pensionary (the de facto political leader of the Dutch Republic) and the Stadholder (a descendant of William of Orange) who acted as the Dutch supreme military commander. This system was eventually overthrown in the Batavian Revolution, inspired by the French revolution, in which the Stadholder fled to Britain and the revolutionaries established the Batavian Republic in 1795, which was a more centralised unitary state, not a loose confederation of (at least nominally) independent provinces. The Batavian Republic was actually a vassal state of France, which wanted to tighten its grip by establishing the Kingdom of Holland in 1806 with Napoleon's brother Louis Bonaparte as head of state, and finally by annexation in 1810 for a period of 3 years, until Napoleon was defeated. The independent Dutch state was put back on the map at the Congress of Vienna, comprising of the northern and southern Netherlands for the first time ever, as an independent monarchy, still without many constitutional checks and balances. The revolutions that swept across Europe in 1848 frightened the Dutch King and he conceded to a constitutional monarchy with parliamentary control, which it has been until this day.

Sports

There are a number of sports which the Dutch possibly invented or Dutch claim to have invented, which then spread worldwide, examples include ice hockey and golf. Apart from these worldwide sports there are also a number of local Dutch sports such as polsstokverspringen, kaatsen, klootschieten, kolven and korfbal.

The most popular sports, both for active participation and audience are Football (Soccer), Cycling, Speed skating, (Field, not ice) Hockey and Tennis.

Dutch language

Dutch is a West Germanic language spoken by around 22 million people, mainly in the Netherlands, Belgium and Surinam. The language was first attested around 470 AD. Dutch is an official language of the Netherlands, Belgium, Suriname, Aruba, and the Netherlands Antilles. The Dutch, Flemish and Surinamese governments coordinate their language activities in the Nederlandse Taalunie ('Dutch Language Union'). Dutch was an official language in South Africa up until 1961, having fallen into disuse since Afrikaans (itself a descendant of Dutch) became an official language in 1925. The Dutch immigrants of the 20th century often quickly began to speak the language of their new country. For example of the inhabitants of New Zealand, 0.7% say their home language is Dutch despite the percentage of Dutch herritage, is considerably higher.

Algemeen Beschaafd Nederlands ('Common Dutch', abbreviated to ABN) is the standard language as taught in schools and used by authorities in the Netherlands, Flanders, Suriname, Aruba and the Netherlands Antilles. The Dutch Language Union defines what is ABN and what is not, for example in terms of orthography.

Dutch names

In Dutch society a given name is given to a child by the parents shortly after, or before, birth. It is common to give a child several given names, particularly among Catholics, but only one of them is meant to be for daily use. This is often underlined on official documents, as it is often the second or third christian or a different name not even related to the christian names. Dutch surnames are easily recognisable, mainly because of tussenvoegsels such as van, van der or de. In the United States, partly due to the fame of rich industrials such as Cornelius Vanderbilt, Dutch surnames are often associated with the upperclass of society even though when translated the surnames are often very simplistic. For example, Vanderbilt means "(coming) from De Bilt", De Bilt being a small village in the province of Utrecht.

The image of the Dutch

Symbols

Stereotype "Dutch" symbols such as wooden shoes, tulips, cheese and windmills, are not national symbols of the Netherlands, but reflect a popular image of the Netherlands and the Dutch people. The Netherlands itself has standard national symbols, including the Dutch flag and the national colour orange. The red, white and blue flag is the oldest tricolour in continuous use until today. Orange is the symbolic colour of the Dutch royal family, the House of Orange-Nassau. Another symbol of the Dutch is Het Wilhelmus, the Dutch (as well as the worlds oldest) anthem, and is about the Dutch war of independence.

Self-image

The Dutch self-image differs considerably from the image(s) other people have of them (see section below). The Dutch often acknowledge that they greatly value hygiene, are thrifty, have an excellent feel for business, are good at foreign languages and have an ability to coexist with others. The Dutch pride in their tolerance and flexibility, and are generally modest people. Negative charactaristics are a secret mistrust of foreigners and a distaste of alien cuisine.

Dutch image worldwide

Many nations regard the Dutch as being organized and efficient, but harmless at the same time due to the stereotypical mental picture of "a nation of rosy-cheeked farmers who live in windmills, wear clogs, have a garden full of tulips and sit on piles of yellow cheese". Apart from the more or less touristy image described above, the Dutch also have a reputation for being opinionated, stubborn and incurably mean. Belgians even consider them to be downright devious in business affairs. Dutch frankness completely overwhelms more reticent peoples such as the Japanese who consider the Dutch to be the most arrogant of all the Europeans they do business with, but at the same time are impressed by their reputation as formidable merchants. "Where a Dutchman has passed, not even the grass grows anymore" a Japanese saying goes. English people survey the Dutch with guarded approval, as the closest any "continentals" will come to the sacred state of being English. It wasn't always like this. At the time of the Anglo-Dutch Wars in the 17th century these two nations were at each other’s throats. An English pamphlet raged: "A Dutchman is a Lusty, Fat, Two-legged Cheese worm. A Creature that is so addicted to eating butter, drinking fat, and sliding (skating) that all the world knows him for a slippery fellow". At this time the English language gained a whole array of new insults such as "Dutch courage" (booze-induced bravery), "Dutch comfort" ("Things could be worse!") and "Dutch gold" (alloy resembling gold). Others include:

These terms also gained prominence in 17th century New England during their rivalry with New Holland which was captured (and later recaptured by the Dutch) during the Second Anglo-Dutch War.

The Dutch in popular culture

Dutch people generally appear in popular culture in two completely distinct ways. The traditional Dutch image (people in national dress, wearing clogs, having blond hair and blue eyes, standing in front of wide, flat landscapes covered with tulips and windmills in the background) and the more recent, and mostly negative, image of non-religious drug addicts, who legalized prostitution, marihuana, abortion, euthanasia and gay marriage.

None of these stereotypical images are correct. Dutch people only wear traditional costumes on very special occasions or to entertain tourists. Clogs, or wooden shoes, are not usually worn in public life (although clogs can be seen in public in some smaller towns) but are still widely used for gardening and in farming. The drug and value related stereotypes of the Dutch are relatively recent, from around 1985. The Dutch laws no longer establish drug use and small scale sales of some drugs as a criminal act, which created the widespread stereotype that the Dutch are drug addicts, especially in the Western Hemisphere. In spite of, or perhaps due to this, the Dutch have a low figure of drug offences by country and the health effects of drugs are relatively well-controlled. Despite the high priority given by the Dutch government to fighting narcotics trafficking, the Netherlands continue to be an important transit point for drugs entering Europe as well as a major producer and exporter of amphetamines and other synthetic drugs.

Legalisation of prostitution was mainly motivated by the wish to protect the health of prostitutes and to fight the trafficking in human beings. Gay marriage, abortion and euthanasia stem from deeply developed values concerning the individual right of personal liberty and self-determination.

Dutch views on others

Dutch people tend to judge foreign cultures using the standards and values they hold dear. Especially cultures whose religious or political customs are seen as intolerant (compared to Dutch standards) are looked down upon.

In comparison to most other cultures, the Dutch are rather reserved in public and do not often touch each other or display anger or extreme exuberance. This is why people and cultures who display these "vices", for example those living around the Mediterranian Sea, are regarded as being too emotional. In Dutch society, extravagantly flaunting ones emotions (whether positive or negative) is seen as lack of control or even as having a psychological disorder.

After centuries of close commercial, military, cultural and religious relations between the Netherlands and the British Isles, the Dutch have a generally positive opinion of the British. Anglophone television programmes and English literature are popular and held in high regard, and English is widely spoken. Americans are typically also thought to be principally "good" people, though somewhat uneducated, unsophisticated and badly guided by their politicians.

For many years, most recently since WWII, a strong animosity existed towards Germans. They were said to be rude, arrogant, noisy and intolerant and in fact most other antonyms of characteristics the Dutch pride themselves on. For many Dutch people it is not a question of "why" they dislike Germans, they just do. According to "The Xenophobe's Guide to the Dutch", "Telling a Dutch person that their language seems very similar to German is unlikely to benefit your relationship." It humorously adds: "Remarking that the two nations are similar in many ways will probably get you thrown out of the house."

Perhaps strangely, Germans are generally unaware of the fact that they are disliked by their neighbours and often think it is merely a soccer phenomenon, as this is when the anti-German feelings are most visible. The Dutch and Germans have had fierce soccer rivalry ever since the Second World War, even though the post war rivalry on Germany's side is actually a reaction on the behaviour displayed by the Dutch.

Dutch antipathy towards Germans goes back to the early 15th century when Germans were seen as uneducated, grumpy, rude peasants who served as cheap labour to the wealthier Dutch.
Entire stories were published in which Germans were portrayed as inferior barbarians.

Belgians have an entirely different image. They feature prominently in Dutch jokes in which they are typically portrayed as stupid and uneducated. This is however commonly accepted to be a fictional stereotype, originating at the time of the Belgian Revolution, in which the Flemish and Walloons seceded from the United Kingdom of the Netherlands. Generally Belgians are admired for their educational and health system. Most, if not all, Dutch people consider the Belgians to be the closest related people. It should however be noted that the Dutch, when they speak of Belgians, nearly always mean the Flemish (the Dutch speaking inhabitants of Belgium) rather than the Walloons.

Literature

• Geschiedenis van de Nederlanden. By J. H. C. Blom et al.
• The Xenophobe's Guide to the Dutch. By Rodney Bolt. Oval Projects Ltd 1999, ISBN 190282525X
• The Dutch in America, 1609-1974. By Gerald Francis De Jong. Twayne Publishers 1975, ISBN 0805732144
• Dutch South Africa: early settlers at the Cape, 1652-1708. By John Hunt, Heather-Ann Campbell. Troubador Publishing Ltd 2005, ISBN 1904744958.
• The Undutchables, by White & Boucke, ISBN 1-888580-32-1.
• The Persistence of Ethnicity: Dutch Calvinist pioneers. By Rob Kroes. University of Illinois Press 1992, ISBN 0252019318

Notes/References

1. 13 186 600, autochtone population at 01 January 2006, Central Statistics Bureau, Integratiekaart 2006, (external link)
2. Germanic heritage of the Dutch. (Dutch)
3. Encyclopædia Britannica article on Germanic peoples. " any of the Indo-European speakers of Germanic languages."
4. This is when the people who report Dutch ancestry are added (for example Dutch Americans).
5. This is when the Flemings are added. Among supporters of the Greater Netherlands/Dietsland and those who advocate (even) closer ties between the Flemish and Dutch, this is a common definition.
6. See the Dutch diaspora section.
7. | Definition by the Dutch Central Buro of Statistics (CBS) in Dutch
8. Han Nicolaas. Nederland: van immigratie- naar emigratieland? Central Bureau voor de Statistiek, (external link)
9. NIDI Atlas (external link)
10. Statistics Netherlands has the definition the following definition of "autochtoon": "Both parents are born in the Netherlands, no matter where the person is born." This means that the children of Dutch immigrants who left the Netherlands in the 1960s and 1970s (often while still in their twenties) are considered autochthonous.
11. Geschiedenis van de Nederlanden speaks of "(Zuid)Nederlanders" (Southern)Dutch. "Flemish" in its modern meaning doesn't appear until the early 20th century.
12. Essay by Prof. dr P.C. Paardekooper. (Dutch)
13. 'Ons volk bestaat niet' (Our people doesn't exist) in Dutch.
14. Limburgish is spoken in both the Dutch province of Limburg as well as the Belgian province of the same name.Brabantic is spoken in the Belgian province of Antwerp and Flemish Brabant as well as the Dutch province of North Brabant and West Flemish forms a continuum with Zealandic. (Occasionally Zealandic is grouped together with West-Flemish)
15. Currently Roman Catholicism is the single largest religion of the Netherlands, forming the religious home of some 27,0 % according to Church Statistics. (Link to figures, in Dutch)
16. Perceptie van similariteit, page 21. (Dutch)
17. For example the Joshua Project. "People Name General: Dutch", "Alternate People Names: Fleming".
18. about 25% of the members of the Flemish parliament, elected by the Flemish, are part of Vlaams Belang, a party which supports the separation of Flanders from Belgium, but not necessarily linking up with the 'Hollanders'.
19. According to Dutch nationality law, an Afrikaner (or South African in general for that matter) can become a Dutch citizen. However, wether he or she would be considered an allochtoon or autochtoon (the latter close to "ethnic Dutch" in English) would depend on the fact if their (grand)parents where born in the Netherlands. An Afrikaner with one Dutch-born parent would be considered an allochtoon, while two Dutch-born parents would make him or her an autochtoon.
20. Frisian history. (English)
21. Red-haired barbarians, the Dutch in Japan.
22. ^ Both Spinoza as Anne Frank are of non-Dutch heritage. While Anne Frank did have some Dutch blood from her mothers lineage, Spinoza has none since his family were originally Portuguese Jews. Nevertheless, they are generally considered Dutch in the sense they were Dutch nationals raised with Dutch language and culture alongside their own Jewish heritage, who considered themselves members of the Dutch ethnic group as well. This respect goes both ways as is illustrated by their inclusion in a recent game show aiming to identify the Greatest Dutchman of all times (as can be seen here), and the depiction of Spinoza on largest denomination of the national heroes series of Dutch guilder banknotes designed in the 1970s
23. Many economic historians regard the Netherlands as the first thoroughly capitalist country in the world. In early modern Europe it featured the wealthiest trading city (Amsterdam) and the first full-time stock exchange. The inventiveness of the traders led to insurance and retirement funds as well as such less benign phenomena as the boom-bust cycle, the world's first asset-inflation bubble, the tulip mania of 1636-1637, and according to Murray Sayle, the world's first bear raider - Isaac le Maire, who forced prices down by dumping stock and then buying it back at a discount ("Japan Goes Dutch", London Review of Books : 3-7).
24. Scientific study of the Dutch genes.
25. Planet Internet article.] It says the Dutch have 43% brown, and 40% blonde hair and thus 17% other).
26. Dutch, World’s Tallest People, Just Keep Growing.
27. Dutch, World’s Tallest People, Just Keep Growing, last line.
28. For example the introduction of Indonesian spices and herbs to the Dutch cuisine in the 16th century.
29. Artcyclopedia, list of most popular artists, Van Gogh ranks 2nd, Rembrandt 7th.
30. A. Th. van Deursen in J. H. C. Blom et al., Geschiedenis van de Nederlanden, p. 118, quoted above.
31. "Far-right party suffers rebuff in Antwerp" (HTML). The Washington Times. 2006-10-10. Retrieved 2006-10-14. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |date= (help); Cite has empty unknown parameter: |coauthors= (help)
32. Statistical Yearbook of the Netherlands 2006, page 43
33. Religion in the Netherlands, by Statistics Netherlands.
34. See the Ice Hockey article.
35. Golf was mentioned on February 26 in the year 1297 for the first time in the Netherlands in a city called Loenen aan de Vecht. Here the Dutch played a game with a stick and leather ball. He who hit the ball in a target several hundreds of meters away the least number of times, won.
36. "Maltho thi afrio lito" is the oldest attested (Old) Dutch sentence, found in the Salic Law, a legal text written around 470AD.
37. See article on New Zealand
38. See the history section of the Vanderbilt family article, or visit this link.
39. The Dutch anthem was written between 1568 and 1572 during the Eighty Years' War. The Japanese anthem has older lyrics, but the melody wasn't added until the early 20th century.
40. ^ The Xenophobe's Guide to the Dutch; "How they see themselves"
41. Profile of the Netherlands by NRC Handelsblad. (English)
42. For example in the village of Volendam.
43. The Xenophobe's Guide to the Dutch, page 4 and 5; "How they see others" and "Special relations".
44. The Undutchables, by White & Boucke, ISBN 1-888580-32-1.
45. Onbekende Buren, by Dik Linthout, page 60 till 64 "voetbal".
46. "Waarom wordt een Duitser Mof genoemd?" (Why is a German called "Mof"?), in Dutch.
47. Dutch etymological dictionary for "mof".
48. (Link) Explanation of Anti-German sentiment in the Netherlands. (Dutch)
49. Clingendael, "What do you think about with the word "Belgians", "Flemish" or "Walloons"? (Dutch, page 39)
50. The Xenophobe's Guide to the Dutch, page 4 and 5; "How they see others" and "Special relations".

See also

• Demographics of the Netherlands
• List of Dutch people
• Dutch customs and etiquette
• Netherlands diaspora

• Dutch society
• Ethnic groups in Europe
• West Germanic peoples