RESEARCH TALK ▼

IT'S VERY IMPORTANT TO GET INVOLVED.

AN INTERVIEW WITH ANDRÉ KROUWEL | by Theresa Schmitz

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SHORT PROFILE

Name: André Krouwel
Field: Political Science
Country: The Netherlands
Occupation: Professor of Political Science and Communication at Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, Academic Director of Kieskompas
Research Interests: Role of Political Parties in European Democracies, Rise (and Fall) of New Political Parties, (Negative) Political Attitudes, Political Cynicism, EU-Rejectionism and Anti-Establishment Euro Attitudes, Online Opinion Polling, Parliamentary and Presidential Election Campaigns, Voting Behaviour, Social Movements

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You are a political scientist researcher and you went into politics with the PvdA [Partij van de Arbeid, Dutch Social Democratic Party]: What motivated you to go into politics as a political scientist and, especially, one whose main field is party research?

A.K.: I wasn't a political scientist when I went into politics. I went into politics at a very young age; when I was a very young teenager. The main issue at the time was nuclear armament and the placement of cruise missiles in Europe. That was a big issue. The Americans actually planted nuclear arms on our territory whereas parliament had voted against it. So I became very active in defending the place where they were stationed [Soesterberg]. I became very active in the anti-nuclear movement, the anti-war movement. That politicised me very much. And I also became very interested in politics and in power: Why can people do something that we don't want, right? A parliament votes, you voted for these people, they voted against it and then it still happens. So I was thought: What the hell is going on here? How can this happen? So I became very interested in power.

I also come from a working class background, my mother was a cleaning lady and my father was a labourer at the harbour, so naturally our family drifted to the left, a very red family. Therefore, when I became very politicised, I became active on the left. I am a lifelong member of the Labour party. I was a member at 18, when I was first allowed to join. Now, I think you can join when you are younger but back then it was 18. And I'm still a member. I am also active in the sense that I help politicians that want to figure out information such as: How are we doing in the opinion polls? But I do that with multiple parties. I work with the Fortuyn party in Rotterdam for example. My father was a labourer at the harbour in Rotterdam so they think I'm one of them. That is really nice. In some cases, it is true, I feel very connected to what they're arguing about: their city, their jobs and it is basically the defence of their life. They feel that their life is threatened. I was working with them and one of my best friends that I grew up with became very religious. He was like me, very secular, but at that time he became very religious and is now a member of parliament for the Christian Union which is this radical [party] so I also worked with them. I am actually very active in terms of working with different political parties, analysing their electoral success and failures. I wrote the report for the green left, I worked with Simon Otjes who is also a political scientist. We worked on the election compass data to see why the green left lost so much in the last election. I do all kinds of things. I was a member of local council for twelve years. When I came to Amsterdam I was very politically active. I did that for twelve years but after that I said: Ok it's time for the next [thing]. I was very young when I did that. But I did do that for twelve years, which is three terms. That's long.

So it was the other way around: You were first motivated to learn more about politics and power and then decided to…

A.K.: I decided to know more about it, yes. And that's why I studied it. Then I became less interested in formulating the policies. However, I still feel very strongly about certain policies, for example social housing or I should say mixed housing in cities. But I don't do that anymore because it's very time consuming. It's three, four evenings a week, a lot of preparation work, a lot of reading. I've done my share, I would say, for twelve years.

Twelve years is a long time!

A.K.: Exactly, everybody does their twelve years, I'm off the hook so please, somebody else go do that (laughter). After this, I started to do more advisory work using the skills that I have now to analyse opinion data and electoral data and telling parties what their chances of success are. In this, I don't discriminate between left and right. I work with all parties because I think it's interesting. There's also an interesting dynamic on the right.

In what sense?

A.K.: Well the right doesn't invite me as much as the left does because they recognize that I am clearly a progressive leftie lunatic. And I go on television, I'm a talking head, and you recognize when I speak that I am not a conservative right wing defender of market capitalism so clearly the left is more inclined to invite me and talk to me. But I must say that the populist right seems to embrace me as well and that's interesting. I like to look inside parties. I am becoming increasingly interested in the inner workings of parties, also through my work, of course, in analysing party organization such as leadership effects. Populist parties especially have this strong leadership element which interests me. As I showed in my lecture (at the workshop), I also like to study the extent to which this influences their electoral success and appeal. I'm also interested in new parties and their survival. I do a lot of analysis at the local level, even though I'm not active as a council member anymore. I analyse local parties because local parties now get almost a third of the vote in the Netherlands; a quarter to a third of the vote. National parties are basically losing the local level which drains them from resources and from training ground. That's an interesting development, also for national politics, so that's why I follow local politics and I also make these websites [kieskompas.nl] at the local level. So I know a lot about that.

So your work as a politician enhances your work as a researcher? You don't see a conflict between working with different political parties as a researcher while being an active member of the political society yourself?

A.K.: No I think it's very important that you do both. I don't think it affects my work or the quality of an academic paper if I have talked to people and I have my own opinion. It's like saying a dentist can't be a good dentist because he votes for the Liberal party, he could still be a good dentist right?

I can still be a very good data analyst and write interesting papers without my political view or activities, or my radical past, being in the way of any good political science. In fact, I think this active connection, both in looking inside parties and actively being involved in what goes on inside parties, and talking to people and debating with them, actually enhances my work because I think I get more insight than just sitting at my desk. You know, being a professor that just sits behind his desk. We're looking at real existing entities here, why not connect and interact with them? Because I make these websites I have to interact - we create them in cooperation with these parties. I have to get involved but it's true that, because I became this VAA [Voting Advice Application] maker, I cannot be associated strongly with one party. I couldn't go into parliament or act as a local anymore. It's no problem that I have my views and I speak out when I think it's necessary but it would be very difficult for me to be associated with or paid for by a political party. Because then, rightly so, the people would not work with me anymore. So I don't do that anymore. That would limit my ability to make the websites. ◼

// Interview and Editing: Theresa Schmitz

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