“Mark Rutte looks at you as if you've just crawled out from under a stone”

"Fred Teeven is the epitome of the average Dutch citizen," the academic was told by one person he spoke to, when it was mentioned that Teeven would become a bus driver after leaving his career in politics. Noordzij was conducting research on the effect of the education gap on political dissatisfaction. Political dissatisfaction is often more likely among less-educated citizens, and Noordzij wanted to gain a better understanding of the reasons for this. To this end, he spoke to a large number of less-educated citizens – in their homes and at the pub, etc.

To get the conversation started with participants, Noordzij showed interviewees an album containing the photographs of various politicians. Interviewees could also bring along their own photos of politicians they wanted to have their say about and illustrate their opinions with. While attitudes towards some politicians were sympathetic – because of the better fit they seem to have with the life-world of participants – they were far less positive about most politicians. For example, one participant said that “Mark Rutte looks at you as if you’ve just crawled out from under a stone," while Rob Jetten "has a very robotic speaking style " and, like many other politicians, "never just gives an honest answer".

Diploma democracy

The explanation for political dissatisfaction is often sought in a lack of knowledge or the poorer economic position of less-educated citizens. Although these factors do certainly play a role, Noordzij believes that it does not entirely explain the education gap. To find out more, he decided to research the distance that many less-educated citizens perceive between themselves and politicians and the role this plays in their level of dissatisfaction with politics. "Dutch politics is characterised by its strong underrepresentation of less-educated citizens," the researcher explains. More than 90% of politicians in the Dutch House of Representatives have a university or higher professional education background, whereas approximately 30% of the Dutch population have attained this level of education. This phenomenon is referred to as diploma democracy.

In one of the studies that Noordzij did as part of his experiment, he set out to see whether the less-educated citizens who saw Roderick van der Veer reacted differently to him than those who were confronted with Rob de Bruin. He also included an existing measurement of support for aggressive action against the government. "What was striking was that less-educated citizens who saw the elitist politician expressed more support for action of this nature than those who saw the more working-class politician". Noordzij believes this illustrates the importance of considering the consequences that a perceived cultural distance has on how less-educated citizens, who have seen themselves underrepresented for a long time, relate to democracy.

Noordzij is of the opinion that perceived cultural distance is an important explanation for the effect of the education gap on political dissatisfaction. Although he realises it will not be easy to close this gap, he does make a number of recommendations in his dissertation. For example, political parties could increase the number of less-educated people in politics, so they feel they are being represented more. "More sensitivity is also necessary to the experiences of less-educated citizens: not just at the municipal desk or by government but in society too."