Karl,
In general secularisation has hit the Netherlands hard since the sixties. Until the early sixties the Netherlands was a rather segregated country due to the pillarisation. People lived largely in their own sphere, religion, group and class within their own pillar.
The Calvinist Dutch Reformed pillar (the Dutch Reformed church and the Reformed Churches) and the Roman Catholic pillar were extremely strong with their own political parties, Unions, Employers organisations, universities, primary and highschool education systems, newspapers, magazines, radio & television stations and Chanals, youth organisations, women organisations, sport clubs, hobby organisations, family organisations, hospitals, nursing homes, cemeteries and charity organisations.
Next to them you had the strong Social Democratic (Labour) socialist pillar of the Red Labour Party voting workers and Socialist Union members. Like the Roman Catholics the Social Democrats had their own schools, press/media, Radio/TV (VARA
en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Omroepvereniging_VARA ), student organisation, youth movement (Young Socialists and the Arbeiders Jeugd Centrale -Workers Youth Centre-), women’s organisation (Rode Vrouwen - Red Women-) and Environmental organization (NIVON;
nl.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nivon -translate the text if you want to read it via Google translate) and etc. The same was the case for the ‘General pillar’ of the secular liberals, mainly Centre right classical liberals and conservative liberals but also progressive centre left social liberals, called Free thinking (Vrijzinnige) liberals (liberalen) in Dutch.
New Left, Free Love, the Sexual Revolution, the Hippy & Peace movement, anti-authoritarianism (resistance towards the old Patriarchal public order of the Calvinists, Roman-Catholics, Conservative liberals and the old Guard of Social Democrats - of whom some were quite social conservative-), leftism, new pragmatic (American) forms of liberalism, people losing their faith, less traditionalist attitudes, habits and convictions, Neo-Marxism, Radical leftwing socialist (Marxist) democratization movements, the Anti-Vietnam War movement, Feminism & Female emancipation, and new movements and parties that came from within the Calvinist Reformed Protestant and Roman Catholic pillars which formed ‘Little left’ in the Dutch parliament together with the Dutch communist left of the Dutch Social Democratic Labour Party, brought secularism to the Netherlands.
The political party GroenLinks (Dutch pronunciation: [ɣrunˈlɪŋks], lit. 'GreenLeft') is a green political party in the Netherlands and an example of that secularisation movement in the Netherlands during the sixties, seventies, eighties and nineties. It was formed on 1 March 1989 from the merger of four left-wing parties: the Communist Party of the Netherlands, the Pacifist Socialist Party, the Political Party of Radicals and the Evangelical People's Party, which shared left-wing and progressive ideals and earlier co-operated in Regenboog-coalition (Rainbow coalition) for the 1989 European Parliament election.
GroenLinks (‘GreenLeft’) was founded in 1989 as a merger of four parties that were to the left of the Labour Party (PvdA), a social-democratic party which has traditionally been the largest centre-left party in the Netherlands. The founding parties were the (destalinised) Communist Party of the Netherlands (CPN), the Pacifist Socialist Party (PSP), which originated in the peace movement, the green-influenced Political Party of Radicals (PPR), originally a progressive Christian party, and the progressive Christian Evangelical People's Party. These four parties were frequently classified as "small left" (“Klein Links”); to indicate their marginal existence. But they were more influential than their seize, and participated in the secularisation process or in a new progressive, leftist (Christian socialism, Liberation theology and etc.), the peace movement and anti-authoritarian activism. In the 1972 general election these parties won sixteen seats (out of 150), in the 1977 general election they only won six. From that moment on, members and voters began to argue for close cooperation.
From the 1980s onwards the four parties started to cooperate in municipal and provincial elections. As fewer seats are available in these representations, a higher percentage of votes is required to gain a seat. In the 1984 European election, the PPR, CPN and PSP formed the Green Progressive Accord that entered as one into the European elections. They gained one seat, which rotated between the PSP and PPR. Party-members of the four parties also encountered each other in grassroots extraparliamentary protest against nuclear energy and nuclear weapons. More than 80% of the members of the PSP, CPN and PPR attended at least one of the two mass protests against the placement of nuclear weapons, which took place in 1981 and 1983.
The Evangelical People's Party was a relatively new party, founded in 1981, as a splinter group from the Christian Democratic Appeal, the largest party of the Dutch centre-right. During its period in parliament, 1982–1986, it had trouble positioning itself between the small left parties (PSP, PPR and CPN), the PvdA and the CDA.
The European New Left appeared first in West Germany, which became a prototype for European student radicals. German students protesting against the Vietnam war often wore discarded US military uniforms, and they made influential contacts with dissident GIs—draftees who did not like the war either.
In Europe Provo was a Dutch counterculture movement in the mid-1960s that focused on provoking violent responses from authorities using non-violent bait. One manifestation of this was the French general strike that took place in Paris in May 1968, which nearly toppled the French government.
Another Radical example of the secularisation process during the sixties and secularisation within the Dutch pillarized political system were the Democrats 66 (Today D66). The party was founded on 14 October 1966 by a group of 44 people. Its founders were described as homines novi, although 25 of the 44 had previously been members of another political party. The initiators were Hans van Mierlo, a journalist for the Algemeen Handelsblad, and Hans Gruijters, a municipal councillor in Amsterdam. Van Mierlo became the party's political leader. The foundation of the party was preceded by the "Appeal 1966" on October 10, in which the founders appealed to the people of the Netherlands to re-take their democratic institutions. The party renounced the 19th-century political ideologies, which dominated the political system and sought to end pillarisation. It called for radical democratisation of the Dutch political system, and for pragmatic and scientific policy-making.
The secular humanist, social liberal, Centre left D66 party of Sigrid Kaag is especially popular among people who hold a university degree, and its voters are mostly concentrated in larger cities and in municipalities with an above-average number of wealthy residents. The party supplies a relatively large proportion of mayors, who are appointed rather than elected. D66 is a member of the Liberal International (LI) and the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe (ALDE).
Karl, I do believe that Dutch cities and towns are more secular than the rural countryside. Farmers, Fishermen and people from smaller towns, villages and hamlets in the 12 Dutch provinces are slightly more traditional, conservative and christian. You have the Dutch Christian Protestant Countryside due to the Bible Belt in the rural agricultural provinces of Zeeland, South-Holland, Gelderland and Overijssel. Although the countryside (the Rural Netherlands) is slightly more Christian, also there the secularisation has hit the communities hard. Young people don’t go to church and only some old folks still go. Like some Scandinavian countries, Latvia and the Czech Republic we are a very secular country. I can’t deny that Karl.
Cheers,
Pieter