In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:

Can a Minority Retain Its Identity in Law? The 2005 Multatuli Lecture Job Cohen Ladies and Gentlemen, It is an honor and a pleasure for me to address you here today in the Grote Kerk of Breda in the context of the 2005 Multatuli Lecture. The theme about which I have been asked to say something is: Can a minority retain its identity in law? Introduction Since this is the Multatuli Lecture, let me start out from his work, with a quote from ‘‘Idea Number 7’’ about the relationship of majorities to minorities: Ruling by a majority of votes is the law of the strongest applied amicably. It means: if we fought, we would win . . . so let’s skip the fighting. This system leads not so much to truth as to quiescence. Yet only for the moment, and as a palliative, since the members of the minority usually think they are right and are individually stronger, not so much because of their awareness of being right as because of their more closed ranks and their greater incentive to make an effort. When a minority grows into a majority, it loses the specific value it initially gained by enlarging its numbers. It adopts all the errors of its defeated opponents, who, in their turn, make a virtue of defeat. The upshot is sad. Asking about minorities presupposes that there is a majority. Today’s story therefore concerns not only ‘‘minorities’’ but also the ‘‘majority.’’ 5 39 JOB C OHEN Moreover, talking about minorities is always a question of time and context. What a majority denies a minority may in turn be denied to that majority if it later finds itself in the minority position. Let us keep Multatuli’s idea in mind as we examine today’s question in greater detail. I propose to approach the subject as follows. First, I will discuss what we in the Netherlands understand by the term minorities and what we have understood by it in the past, as there is a significant difference in this respect between today and yesterday. I will then go on to discuss, from the perspective of fundamental rights, the main question, that is, whether a minority can retain its identity in law. The final question I will deal with is what social problems are concealed by today’s question. I will conclude by outlining how we can best tackle the problem to which the question points. What Is a Minority? The Netherlands: Traditionally a Country of Minorities The Netherlands is the country of minorities par excellence. It is a country in which no group is so dominant that it can lay down the law to other groups. The country therefore has a long tradition in which not unity but the individual parts have played the central role. It is in these parts that it has all happened. The struggle has been not so much between the parts as within the parts, and this struggle has sometimes been bitter. In his book Republic of Rivalries, historian Piet de Rooij formulates this as follows. The most characteristic feature of Dutch society can be described as ‘‘unity in diversity.’’1 In his view, the Netherlands has been a country not of bitter disputes between parts but of continuing rivalries. The parts have not always been the same. Originally they were, above all, a person’s own city or region, but the nineteenth century saw a division of society along denominational or ideological lines. Until recently, Dutch society was nothing more than a combination—or rather, a cohabitation—of different groups (Protestants , Catholics, Socialists, and Liberals, to mention just the largest groups), all of which were minorities. No matter how the dividing lines ran, it was generally accepted that pragmatic compromises had to be reached in which it was important that all groups should feel that they had benefited equally. At the top the leaders of the different denominational or ideological ‘‘pillars [zuilen]’’ came together to discuss how matters should proceed. But others in these pillars had little if any contact with members of other pillars. And people readily accepted this. In the course of the twentieth century, the unity of the Netherlands evolved mainly through the recognition of the right of others to be different. Tolerance of being different became the norm and was directly and above all linked to maintaining scope for the interests and rights of one’s own group. This right to be different and yet to...

Share