Femke Halsema

"Halsema" redirects here. For other uses, see Halsema (disambiguation).

Femke Halsema
Femke Halsema in 2010
Parliamentary leader - GreenLeft House of Representatives of the Netherlands
In office 26 November 2002 – 16 December 2010
Preceded by	Paul Rosenmöller
Succeeded by	Jolande Sap
Member of the House of Representatives
In office 19 May 1998 – 12 January 2011
Succeeded by	Rik Grashoff
Personal details
Born	(1966-04-25) 25 April 1966 Haarlem, Netherlands
Political party	GreenLeft
Residence	Amsterdam
Website	www.femkehalsema.nl

(born 25 April 1966) is a Dutch writer and administrator. Between 1998 and 2011, she was a member of the House of Representatives for the Dutch GreenLeft. She was also the leader of that party between 2002 till 2010.

Career

Career before Politics

Halsema was born in Haarlem in a Dutch social-democratic family. For a long time, her mother, Olga Halsema-Fles was alderperson responsible for social affairs and employment for the Labour Party in Enschede. Her mother is of Jewish decent.

In 1983, Halsema graduated from the Kottenpark-college in Enschede with a Havo-diploma. Between 1984 and 1985 she attends the Vrije Hogeschool (teachers program for Waldorf schools) in Driebergen. In 1985 she starts training as a Dutch and history teacher in Utrecht. In 1988 she leaves the training without graduating. After that she works for a year in Utrecht café. She then starts to study general social science at Utrecht University, specializing in criminology. During these studies she has a number of jobs related to her specialization. Between 1991 and 1993 she is an intern at the working group "police and immigrants" at the Ministry of the Interior and she is a student assistent for professor Frank Bovenkerk. In 1992 she works as an 'supernumerary lecturer in scientific methods and techniques' at the Faculty of Social Sciences of Utrecht University, teaching statistics to first year students.

After she graduates in 1993, she joins the staff of the Wiardi Beckman Stichting (WBS), the research institute of the Labour Party. She was seen as a rising talent in the Labour Party. In 1995 she publishes a book "Ontspoord. Opstellen over criminaliteit & rechtshandhaving" (Derailed, essays about crime and law enforcement) for the WBS. In 1996 travels through the United States, as a fellow for the German Marshall Fund. In 1996 she becomes an editor for the De Helling, the magazine of the research institute of the GreenLeft. In the same year, she started combining her work at the WBS with work for De Balie, a political and cultural centre in Amsterdam, where she met Kees Vendrik, who before that worked for the GreenLeft in parliament. For the Balie she leads the project Res Publica bout the meaning of the Dutch constitution for the modern society. She also joins the program committee of the Labour Party for the 1998 elections. She also published the book "Land in zicht: een cultuurpolitieke benadering van de Ruimtelijke Ordening" (Land ho, cultural-political essays about spatial planning" with Maarten Hajer. She was asked to run for the PvdA in the 1998 elections.

In the autumn of 1997 she leaves the Labour Party and the WBS. The direct cause is the rigorous way that the police handled the protests against the European summit that was working on the Treaty of Amsterdam. The social-democratic mayor Schelto Patijn put 500 people in preventive detention. Her dissatisfaction with the course of the Labour Party had grown. In her view the party was unable to renew its social-democratic manifesto and use the economic tide to invest in the public sector After leaving the WBS, she continues to work at De Balie and also was a columnist at Het Parool and for IKON radio. She also works as an editor at the publisher Van Gennep.

Political Career

In the 1998 elections she runs as a candidate for list of the GreenLeft after being courted by Paul Rosenmöller. She was the third candidate on the list. She was the highest new candidate and practically guaranteed a seat in the House. The seventh was her former De Balie-colleague Vendrik. The GreenLeft more than doubled its seat total from five to eleven. In her first period in parliament, Halsema was spokesperson justice, asylum-seekers and home affairs. She becomes well-known due to her opposition to the tougher migration law proposed by Job Cohen.

In the 2002 elections she was given the second place on the list. The party lost one seat. Halsema becomes vice-chair of the parliamentary party and among others spoke for the party in the first debate with the First Balkenende cabinet. In November of that year Paul Rosenmöller unexpectedly announced that he would leave politics. He asks Halsema to succeed him. She immediately agrees. Ten days before the party congress she is announced as the only candidate for the party leadership and became top candidate for the 2003 elections. The party lost another two seats. In addition to the party leadership she is spokesperson on areas of culture and media, healthcare, spatial planning and the environment. As party leader she has a more prominent position and puts forth a number of private member's bills, including one concerning judicial review and another that sets a fixed prize for books (together with the leader of D66 Boris Dittrich.

Twitter-feest F. Halsema, 27 februari 2010

Between October 2003 and January 2004, Halsema was on maternity leave. She gets twins. Marijke Vos, the vice-chair of the parliamentary party took over as party leader. After her return to the Second Chamber, Halsema started a debate about the course of the left in general and the GreenLeft in particular. She claims that her party is the last "left liberal party in the Netherlands". She calls for increased cooperation with the Socialist Party the Labour Party and the GreenLeft aiming at a left-wing majority government after the 2007 elections. She asked Labour Party Wouter Bos to speak out in favour of sucha cabinet. He refused in order to allow for a possible coalition of the Labour Party and the Christian Democratic Appeal. In January 2006, she was elected "Liberal of the Year" by the Youth Organization for Freedom and Democracy, the youth organization of the Liberal Party, because of her new political course, in particular where it came to reforming the welfare state. In June 2006, she is the only candidate for the top spot on her party's list. During the campaign she published a book, Linkse lente, (Left-wing Spring) co-authored by Michiel Zonneveld, that blends her political vision and personal biography. In the 2006 elections the party lost another seat.

In 2007 she took over the private member bill of Wijnand Duyvendak, who worked together with Niesco Dubbelboer of the Labour Party and Boris van der Ham of D66, to allow for a non-binding corrective referendum. In April 2010 the party congress voted against including the referendum in the party manifesto.

In the run-up to the 2010 elections, Halsema's political profile rose: she was given the Thorbecke prize for political eloquence. and she is elected by Intermediair as the best candidate for prime-minister gezien als de beste premierskandidaat.

During the 2010 elections, the GreenLeft won: the party went from seven to ten seats. The GreenLeft, under Halsema, negotiated with the Liberal Party, the Labour Party and D66 to reach agreement on a new "Purple Plus"-government. The negotiations fail.

On December 17, 2010 Halsema announced that she would leave parliament and that Jolande Sap was elected as the new leader of the GreenLeft. She formally left parliament in January 2011.

In 2016 she made public in her political memoire "Pluche" (Plush) that after the 2012 elections she was asked to consider becoming minister of Development Cooperation by Lodewijk Asscher, the Labour Party leader. The VVD vetoed this however.

Loopbaan na de politiek

Halsema tijdens een try out van haar theatercollege 'Een Vrij Land' in 2018

Since she left politics in January 2011, she has worked as freelancer: she has been active as an administrator, member of advisory committees, in science, as an author and television creator.

Immediately after her political career, Halsema joined De Volkskrant, where she wrote number of articles and columns in 2011 and 2012. In 2013 she was involved in De Correspondent, where she also wrote articles for two years. In 2016 she wrote her political memoir Pluche. In 2017 she wrote the Essay "Nergensland. Nieuw Licht op migratie" (Nowhereland. A new light on migration), where she proposed a utopian alternative to the international refugee question. In 2018 she wrote the essay "Macht en Verbeelding" (Power and Imagination).

In 2011 she became professor by special appointment at Tilburg University occupying the Leonardo Chair for half a year. She taught at the Tilburg School of Humanities. In 2012 she became a temporary professor at University of Utrecht, occupying the Peace of Utrecht Chair. She researched the meaning of social media for human rights and democracy.

In December 2012 she led an inquiry into the behaviour of administrators at the school board of Amarantis. She succeeded Martin van Rijn, who had become junior minister of Health. The committee Halsema found that the board had acted within the law but that their behaviour was not desireable. After that she led a committee on the governance code for the semi-public sector at the request of the minister of Economic Affairs Henk Kamp The final report of the committee concluded that a governance code would not lead to the desired culture change in the semi-public sector. The committee focused its attention on the old boys network and political coopration.. In 2015 she was asked by employees and students at the University of Amsterdam to lead the committee concerning the financial policy of the University. After a month she return the assignment. The committe felt that elementary conditions were not met for independent, careful research Since January 2018, Halsema at the request of the Council of the Judiciary chair of the quadrennual review committee.

Since 2011, Halsema is President-Commissioner at WPG Uitgevers, which is among other responsible for the publisher de Bezige Bij, Vrij Nederland en Voetbal International. Since 2015 Halsema is chair fo the Trade Organization for Healthcare for the Handicapped (VGN). Because of that office she is chair of the Executive Consultation for Healthcare (BOZ), a partnership between employers organizations and patients organizations in the realm of healthcare.. In addition to this she has a number of functions in the public and private sector: between 2012 and 2014 she was chair of the Advisory Council of ASN Bank. Since 2015 she is a member of the board the Start Foundation, a fund for people who have 'distance to the labour market'. And since 2016 she is a commissioner at Independer.. Additionally, Halsema has been a member of the executive of a number of non-profits: between 2011 and 2017 she was chair of the board of Stichting Vluchteling. Since 2017, she is chair of the board of Aidsfonds/Stopaidsnow. She chairs the board of Adelheid Roosen's theatre company and of IDFA.

In 2014 Halsema made the six-part documentary series "Seks en de Zonde" (Sex and Sin) with Hassnae Bouazza about women in the Islamci world. She interviewed activists Veena Malik and Souad al-Shammary for this. Together with Gijs van de Westelaken she developed and produced the TV-series "De Fractie" (The Parliamentary Party) about politics in the Hague. Recently she has been working with her partner Robert Oey on a documentary series on terrorism. In the Spring of 2017 she made theatre tour with her theatre-lecture "Een Vrij Land" (A Free Country).

Political views

Femke Halsema campaigning in 2006

Halsema sees herself as a left-liberal, in Dutch she prefers "vrijzinnig" (free-thinking) over "liberaal" (liberal) because the conservative liberal VVD is seen as the pre-eminent 'liberal' party. In 2004 she started a debate within her party about a new political course. Her new course emphasizes two concepts: freedom and pragmatism.

With the concept freedom Halsema seeks to connect herself with the "freedom-loving traditions of the left". Like Isaiah Berlin, Halsema discerns two traditions of freedom: negative and positive liberty. For Halsema negative liberty is the freedom of citizens from government interference. She wants to apply this concept especially to the multicultural society and rule of law, where she seeks to reduce the influence of government. Positive liberty is, according to Halsema, the emancipation of citizens from poverty. Halsema wants to apply this concept especially to the economy, the welfare state and the environment, where the government should take more action.

With pragmatism Halsema contrasts her politics with those of the new populist political right, such as Pim Fortuyn. While the right, in Halsema's eyes, has become dogmatic and tries to reform society on the basis of new principles, Halsema claims that the left has got more feeling for the "narrow margins of politics." According to Halsema the left now emphasizes equitable outcomes, as opposed to merely fair-minded principles.

This new course has been integrated into several practical proposals on the economy, which together form "Vrijheid Eerlijk Delen" ("Sharing Liberty Fairly"). These proposals have led to considerable debate. Halsema proposes that the main goal of the welfare state should be the emancipation of citizens from poverty. To ensure this she proposes a new model for the welfare state, which is modeled on the Danish welfare state. In her perception of the welfare state the government should endeavour to ensure full employment by cutting taxes on labour, increasing labour flexibility and creating more government jobs. If there is more work, so this theory goes, everybody can get a job, after a maximum of one year of unemployment. She also called for the implementation of a partial basic income.

Private Life

Femke Halsema lives in Amsterdam with her two children and her partner, the documentary maker Robert Oey, who among others made the film "De Leugen" (The Lies) in which Halsema participated amongst others by singing.

Bibliography

• 1995 - Ontspoord. Opstellen over criminaliteit & rechtshandhaving
• 1997 - Land in zicht. een cultuurpolitieke benadering van de Ruimtelijke Ordening (with Maarten Hajer)
• 2005 - Vrijheid als ideaal (edited by Bart Snels)
• 2006 - Linkse lente
• 2008 - Geluk! Voorbij de hyperconsumptie, haast en hufterigheid
• 2010 - Zoeken naar vrijheid
• 2016 - Pluche. Politieke memoires
• 2017 - Nergensland, Nieuw licht op migratie
• 2018 - Macht en Verbeelding. Essay voor de maand van de filosofie

References

• Template:Nl Parlement.com biography

External links

• Femke Halsema
• Drs. F. (Femke) Halsema op parlement.com