Mark Rutte
Mark Rutte is a Dutch politician who has served as the 14th secretary general of NATO since October 2024. He previously served as prime minister of the Netherlands from 2010 to 2024 and leader of the People's Party for Freedom and Democracy from 2006 to 2023. Serving a total of almost 14 years, Rutte is the longest-serving prime minister in Dutch history.
After originally embarking on a business management career working for Unilever, Rutte entered national politics in 2002 as a member of Jan Peter Balkenende's cabinet. Rutte won the 2006 VVD leadership election and led the party to victory in the 2010 general election. After lengthy coalition negotiations, he became prime minister of the Netherlands. He was the first self-described liberal to be appointed prime minister in 92 years.
An impasse on budget negotiations led to his government's early collapse in April 2012, but the VVD's victory in the subsequent election allowed Rutte to return as prime minister to lead his second cabinet between the VVD and the Labour Party, which became the first cabinet to complete a full four-year term since 1998. Though the VVD lost seats in the 2017 general election, it remained the largest party. After a record-length formation period, Rutte was appointed to lead his third cabinet between the VVD, Christian Democratic Appeal, Democrats 66 and Christian Union.
Though Rutte and his cabinet resigned in response to the Dutch childcare benefits scandal, the VVD would go on to win the 2021 general election. Rutte began his fourth term in 2022 after another record-length formation period. On 7 July 2023, he announced his government's resignation after the cabinet failed to agree on how to handle migration. Rutte IV would continue on as an outgoing cabinet, fulfilling a caretaker function and keeping the nation running until the Schoof cabinet was sworn in on 2 July 2024.
For his ability to remain in office until 2024 despite various political scandals, Rutte had been referred to as "Teflon Mark" as "nothing ever seemed to stick to him". He has also been described by the Foreign Policy columnist Caroline de Gruyter as ideologically flexible and pragmatic, willing to accommodate a broad range of political factions in order to address issues, while the Guardian correspondent Jon Henley sees in him a "managerial rather than a visionary leader".
Early life
Rutte was born in The Hague, in the province of South Holland, to a Dutch Reformed family. He is the youngest child of Izaäk Rutte, a merchant, and his second wife Hermina Cornelia Dilling, a secretary. Izaäk Rutte worked for a trading company; first as an importer in the Dutch East Indies; he later ran a car dealership. His second wife was a sister of his first wife, Petronella Hermanna Dilling, who died while they were interned together in Tjideng, a prisoner-of-war camp in Batavia, during World War II. Rutte has seven siblings as a result of his father's two marriages. One of his elder brothers died from AIDS in the 1980s. Rutte later described the deaths of his brother and his father as events that changed the course of his life.Rutte attended the Maerlant Lyceum from 1979 until 1985, specialising in the arts. Although his original ambition was to attend a conservatory and become a concert pianist, he instead went to study history at Leiden University, where he obtained an MA degree in 1992. Rutte combined his studies with a position on the board of the Youth Organisation Freedom and Democracy, the youth organisation of the VVD, and served as chair of the organisation from 1988 to 1991.
After his studies Rutte entered the business world, working as a manager for Unilever and its food subsidiary Calvé. Until 1997, Rutte was part of the human resource department of Unilever, and played a leading role in several reorganisations. Between 1997 and 2000, Rutte was staff manager of the subsidiary Van den Bergh Nederland. In 2000, Rutte became a member of the Corporate Human Resources Group, and in 2002, he became human resource manager for IgloMora Groep, another subsidiary of Unilever.
Political career
Between 1993 and 1997, Rutte was a member of the national board of the VVD. Rutte served as State Secretary at the Social Affairs and Employment Ministry from 22 July 2002 to 17 June 2004 in the First and Second Balkenende cabinets and was responsible for fields including bijstand and arbeidsomstandigheden. After the 2003 elections Rutte was briefly also a member of the House of Representatives, from 30 January to 27 May 2003.In 2003, Rutte supported the US-led invasion of Iraq.
During his time as State Secretary in 2003, Rutte advised municipalities to check Somali residents for social assistance fraud, after a number of Somalis who were working in England were found to be receiving social assistance benefits in the Netherlands as well. A Somali man entitled to benefits was stopped by social investigators and checked for fraud on the basis of his external characteristics, after which he refused the investigators access to his home. The Municipal Executive of Haarlem decided to withdraw his right to social benefits. He disagreed with this and his appeal was upheld by the administrative judge. The court ruled that "an investigation aimed exclusively at persons of Somali descent is discriminatory" and contrary to the Constitution because this distinction is "discrimination based on race". Rutte rejected the criticism, stating that a change in the law would then be necessary to be able to combat targeted fraud.
Rutte later served as State Secretary for Higher Education and Science within the Education, Culture and Science Ministry in the Second Balkenende Cabinet from 17 June 2004 to 27 June 2006, replacing Annette Nijs. In office, Rutte showed particular interest in making the Dutch higher education system more competitive internationally, by trying to make it more market oriented. Rutte resigned from his position in government in June 2006 to return to the House of Representatives, and he soon became the parliamentary leader of the VVD.
Party leadership election
After the resignation of Jozias van Aartsen and a loss in the 2006 Dutch municipal election, the VVD held an internal election for a new Lead Candidate, in which Rutte competed against Rita Verdonk and Jelleke Veenendaal. On 31 May 2006, it was announced that Mark Rutte would be the next lijsttrekker of the VVD. He was elected by 51.5% of party members. Rutte's candidacy was backed by the VVD leadership, including the party board, and many prominent politicians such as Frank de Grave, former minister of Defence, Ivo Opstelten, the mayor of Rotterdam and Ed Nijpels, the Queen's Commissioner of Friesland. The Youth Organisation Freedom and Democracy, the VVD's youth wing of which Rutte had previously been chair, also backed him. During the elections he promised "to make the People's Party for Freedom and Democracy a party for everyone and not just of the elite".2006 general election
For the 2006 general election, the VVD campaign with Rutte as leader did not get off to a good start; he received criticism from within his own party. Rutte was said to be overshadowed by his own party members Rita Verdonk and Gerrit Zalm, as well as being unable to penetrate between Wouter Bos and Jan Peter Balkenende, who were generally seen as the prime candidates to become the next prime minister. On 27 November, it became known that Rita Verdonk, who generally held a more populist view on politics, managed to obtain more votes than Mark Rutte; he obtained 553,200 votes against Verdonk's 620,555. After repeated criticisms by Verdonk on VVD policy, Rutte expelled her from the party's parliamentary group on 13 September 2007.2010 general election
In the 2010 general election, Rutte was once again the lead candidate for the VVD. It won 31 seats and, for the first time ever, became the largest party in the House of Representatives. The lengthy 2010 cabinet formation followed, with several personalities succeeding each other, being appointed by Queen Beatrix in order to find out what coalition could be formed. Efforts to form a broad spectrum coalition between the VVD, CDA and PvdA failed. Instead, the only possibility appeared to be a centre-right coalition of liberals and the Christian Democratic Appeal, with the outside support of the Party for Freedom, led by Geert Wilders.Prime Minister of the Netherlands
First term
After securing support for a coalition between the VVD and CDA, Rutte was appointed as formateur on 8 October 2010; Rutte announced his prospective cabinet, including Maxime Verhagen from the CDA as deputy prime minister. On 14 October, Queen Beatrix formally invited Rutte to form a government, and later that day, Rutte presented his first cabinet to Parliament. The government was confirmed in office by a majority of one, and Rutte was sworn in as Prime Minister of the Netherlands, becoming the first Liberal to serve in the role since Pieter Cort van der Linden in 1918. At 43 years old, he also became the second-youngest prime minister in Dutch history, after Ruud Lubbers.File:Nord Stream ceremony.jpeg|thumb|Nord Stream 1 opening ceremony on 8 November 2011 with Rutte, German Chancellor Angela Merkel, Russian president Dmitry Medvedev and French prime minister François Fillon.
After a victory in the 2011 provincial elections, the VVD secured its status as the lead party within the government. In March 2012, seeking to comply with requirements from the European Union to reduce the nation's deficit, Rutte began talks with his coalition partners on a budget which would cut 16 billion euros of government spending. However, PVV leader Geert Wilders withdrew his party's informal support from the government on 21 April, stating that the proposed budget would hurt economic growth. This led to the early collapse of the government and Rutte submitting his resignation to Queen Beatrix on the afternoon of 23 April. His government had lasted for 558 days, making it one of the shortest Dutch cabinets since World War II.