2023-04-28 02:00:06
More and more activists are taking the government to court. But legal activism has a downside, writes Thijs Broer. Due to the increasing tendency to want to hold others accountable for all forms of disaster, the legal system is coming under increasing pressure.
On behalf of the angry citizen, Johan Derksen joined the program at the end of last year Inside today of leather against Johan Vollenbroek, the environmental activist who regularly takes the government to court, and who, among other things, ensured that the Council of State put an end to the PAS regulation, as a result of which a large part of the construction came to a standstill .
‘The nature freaks have the power here,’ Derksen grumbled. ‘The entire nitrogen problem arose from the fact that a beetle and a plant were affected by it.’ Derksen is not the only one who is concerned about armored activists such as Johan Vollenbroek: irritation is growing on the right side of the political spectrum about action groups that are increasingly succeeding in frustrating government policy.
But the real problem is not the legal activism – the PAS regulation was also a legal monstrosity with which the government tried to circumvent the European nitrogen rules – but the claim culture with which citizens make each other’s lives miserable.
Almost twenty years ago, the British sociologist Frank Furedi already warned in his book Politics of Fear for the ‘organized distrust’ that was spreading in the Western world. In a society that tries to exclude any risk, he argued, damage must always be recovered: bad luck is no longer accepted. This is how we get further and further away from home: the increasing number of claims reinforces mutual distrust, resulting in more claims. “This kind of Anglo-American preoccupation has increasingly become a global phenomenon.” said Furedi in 2001 Free Netherlands. ‘The Netherlands is also increasingly influenced by it. We are only at the beginning of that process and are not yet near the end.’
The courts in the Netherlands now have to contend with a reservoir of lawsuits, partly due to citizens who go to court much faster than before.
In the same years, a think tank of the Ministry of Justice also warned about the claim culture between citizens and the government and citizens themselves: due to the increasing tendency to want to hold others liable for all forms of disaster, the legal system would come under increasing pressure .
That has turned out. The courts in the Netherlands now have to contend with a reservoir of lawsuits, partly due to citizens who go to court much faster than before. The Council for Child Protection can also comment on this: parents are increasingly letting their relationship end in endless fight divorces over the backs of their children and at the expense of the legal system.
In an attempt to combat the growing number of lawsuits and the associated costs, Minister for Legal Protection Sander Dekker tried to overhaul subsidized legal aid under the previous cabinet. He was confronted with a flurry of justified criticism from the legal profession and the Legal Aid Council: it would therefore be more difficult for vulnerable groups to gain access to the law.
It would make more sense if citizens who are now going to court for the slightest thing or the slightest, first consult themselves.
The same goes for Johan Vollenbroek. There is nothing wrong with him wanting to force the government to abide by its own laws. But it was the same Vollenbroek who demanded rectification this week from Arnout Jaspers, who in his book The nitrogen trap Vollenbroek’s organization Mobilization for the Environment called a ‘self-rising litigation machine’ and threatened legal action. Those who have made it their profession to measure others must also be able to take a beating themselves.
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