The evolving role of shareholders in dutch corporate governance, 1900-2010

This chapter looks first at the influence that the ideas and examples of two important neighbouring countries, Great Britain and Germany, exerted on the Netherlands. Capitalism in the Netherlands shows ebb and flow in liberalism and coordination, and in the convergence and divergence with other countries. The influences of the dominant political and economic power of the 20th century, the United States, includes in the comparison because in the Varieties of Capitalism literature the United States and Germany are seen as prototypes of respectively the coordinated and liberal market economy. In the paragraph the experiences of four other small open European economies, those of the Nordic countries-will be examined are a logical choice for comparison with the Netherlands. The recent experiences of four Eastern European countries discussed. The comparison is interesting the countries recently become open economies and therefore face some of the same dilemmas as the Nordic countries and the Netherlands.