Willem "Wim" Kok (Dutch pronunciation: [ˈʋɪm ˈkɔk] ; 29 September 1938 – 20 October 2018) was a Dutch politician and trade union leader who served as Prime Minister of the Netherlands from 22 August 1994 until 22 July 2002. He was a member of the Labour Party (PvdA).
Kok studied business administration at the Nyenrode Business School, obtaining a Bachelor of Business Administration degree, and worked as a trade union leader for the Dutch Confederation of Trade Unions from 1961 until 1976, serving as its chairman from 1972. In 1976 it merged to form the Federation of Dutch Trade Unions, with Kok serving as its first chairman until 1986. In the 1986 general election, Kok was elected to the House of Representatives, taking office on 3 June 1986. Shortly after the election, incumbent leader of the Labour Party Joop den Uyl announced he was stepping down and endorsed Kok as his successor, taking office on 21 July 1986. For the 1989 general election, Kok served as lead candidate, after which he struck a coalition agreement with incumbent Prime Minister Ruud Lubbers of the Christian Democratic Appeal (CDA), forming the third Lubbers cabinet. Kok became deputy prime minister and minister of finance, taking office on 7 November 1989.
For the 1994 general election, Kok served as lead candidate again and, following a cabinet formation, formed the first Kok cabinet, taking office as Prime Minister of the Netherlands on 22 August 1994. For the 1998 general election, Kok served as lead candidate once more, and after another successful cabinet formation, formed the second Kok cabinet, continuing as prime minister for a second term. In December 2001, Kok announced he was stepping down as party leader and that he would not stand for the 2002 general election or serve another term as prime minister. Kok left office following the installation of the first Balkenende cabinet on 22 July 2002.
Kok retired from active politics at 63 and became active in the private and public sectors as a corporate and non-profit director, served on several state commissions and councils on behalf of the government, and continued to be active as a lobbyist for the European Union, advocating further European integration. Kok was known for his abilities as a manager and negotiator. During his premiership, his cabinets were responsible for several major social reforms, such as the legalization of same-sex marriage and euthanasia, and further reducing the deficit. Kok was granted the honorary title of Minister of State on 11 April 2003 and continued to comment on political affairs as a statesman until his death at the age of 80. He holds the distinction of leading the first purple coalitions as prime minister and is consistently ranked both by scholars and the public as one of the best prime ministers after World War II.
Contents
Early life
Willem Kok was born on 29 September 1938, in Bergambacht in the Dutch province of South Holland, the son of Willem Kok, a carpenter, and Neeltje de Jager.
After completing his studies in business at the Nyenrode Business Universiteit, he started his career in 1961 at the socialist Dutch Confederation of Trade Unions (NVV), where he was chairman from 1973 until 1982. In 1982, the NVV merged with the Dutch Catholic Trade Union Federation (NKV) to form the Federation of Dutch Trade Unions (FNV), of which he served as chair until 1986. In this position, he helped negotiate the Wassenaar Agreement.
Political career
Parliamentary leader and Minister of Finance
Kok was elected to the House of Representatives on 3 June 1986, after the 1986 general election. Soon after the election Joop den Uyl, the leader of the Labour Party and the party's parliamentary leader in the House of Representatives, announced that he was stepping down after serving twenty years as party leader. Kok was elected to succeed him and became party and parliamentary leader of the Labour Party in the House of Representatives on 21 July 1986, serving as opposition leader during the parliamentary period of the second Lubbers cabinet.
Kok led his party in the 1989 general election. The Labour Party lost three seats, but the following cabinet formation resulted in a coalition agreement with the Christian Democratic Appeal (CDA), which formed the third Lubbers cabinet. Kok entered government for the first time and became both Deputy Prime Minister of the Netherlands and Minister of Finance, serving from 7 November 1989 until 22 August 1994.
Prime Minister of the Netherlands
In the 1994 general election, the Labour Party lost twelve seats, but the CDA with new leader Elco Brinkman lost twenty seats, making the Labour Party the largest party in the House of Representatives. After an arduous cabinet formation with the conservative liberal People's Party for Freedom and Democracy (VVD) and the social liberal Democrats 66 (D66), a deal was struck that resulted in the first Kok cabinet, with Kok as prime minister. It was considered groundbreaking in Dutch politics as this was the first Cabinet of the Netherlands since 1918 without a Christian democratic party.
The main aim of the first Kok cabinet was to create employment. The Dutch economy had been in a deep recession for years. The market was allowed more influence in the economy. This led to a policy of tax reduction, economizing, and trying to keep people out of social care by supporting employment; large infrastructure projects were set in motion. Another aim was to put an end to the enormous debt of the Dutch government. The Treaty of Amsterdam was signed during this cabinet.
Kok's first term also saw various cuts and changes to education and welfare. Regarding education, spending on education, culture and sciences was cut by 1,772 million guilders. In addition, according to one study, "A law concerning the modernization of the universities' administrative structure replaced the democratized structure of the 1970s with a more autocratic system, inspired by the management style of business concerns." Although primary education received some extra money, which made it possible to introduce computers and decrease the average number of pupils in 4 years, the latter resulted in a shortage of classrooms and teachers. Before 1996, the government provided a study allowance to people with a low income. That year, the Study Costs Allowance Act (WTS) was introduced, under which the number of standard amounts decreased and hard income limits were introduced. According to one study, "It soon became apparent that the WTS gave rise to a lot of distressing situations. These situations are mainly related to the hard income limits that led to a major drop in income. In addition, the income limit of the WTS was independent of the number of children per family." In the 1998 coalition agreement, however, "these hard limits were corrected and more money was made available to more people." Regarding welfare, amendments were made to the General Child Benefit Act in 1995, under which benefit was increased with age only for the first child, while from 1996 child benefit only became payable for children up until the age of 18, while previously child benefit was paid up until the age of 24 under certain circumstances. Social Assistance was revised in 1995, with a tightening of both eligibility and entitlement rules. A special supplement for pensioners was abolished, the eligibility criteria were tightened, certain cash benefits to children and widows were reduced, unemployment eligibility criteria were tightened, and benefits were cut in the disability pension law. A linking law was adopted, which made it possible to link data sets from the population register, social security, and the aliens police
Legacy
Kok was highly praised for his Third Way and polder model philosophies and for the success of leading his Purple Coalitions. During his premiership, his cabinets were responsible for implementing several social reforms, legalizing same-sex marriage and euthanasia, stimulating the economy resulting in more employment and privatization and further reducing the deficit. As a result of this, and because of his skills as a manager and negotiator, Kok was praised by his fellow European leaders.
Subsequent work
After his premiership, Kok retired from active politics at the age of 63 and became a lobbyist for the European Union and presided over several "high-level groups". He also occupied numerous seats on supervisory boards in the business and industry world (ING Group, Koninklijke TNT Post, Royal Dutch Shell, KLM, Stork B.V., International Commission on Missing Persons, International Crisis Group, Anne Frank Foundation and served as president of the Club of Madrid from 2009 until December 2013). On 11 April 2003, he was granted the honorary title of Minister of State.
Lisbon Strategy
Between April and November 2004, Kok headed up a review of the Lisbon Strategy and presented a report containing suggestions on how to give new impetus to the Lisbon process. The European Commission used this report to declare that the social and environmental parts are no longer a priority and declared a return to the Lisbon Agenda under economic terms only. Kok lobbied for the Lisbon Strategy of the European Commission and was appointed to the Honorary Board of the European Association of History Educators.
Between 2006 and 2007, Kok served as member of the Amato Group, a group of high-level European politicians unofficially working on rewriting the Treaty establishing a Constitution for Europe into what became known as the Treaty of Lisbon following its rejection by French and Dutch voters.
Personal life
In 1965, after four years of dating, Kok married Margrietha Lummechiena "Rita" Roukema (born 3 November 1939). He adopted her two children from a previous marriage, daughter Carla (born 1959) and son André (born 1961 and died 30 March 2022), who was mentally disabled, and together they had a third child, son Marcel (born 1966). Kok lived in Amsterdam from 1960 until his death, first in the neighbourhood of Osdorp and later Slotervaart.
Death
On October 20, 2018, Wim Kok died from heart failure in a hospital in Amsterdam, aged 80, in the presence of his wife, children and grandchildren.