De Bijlmermeer: Een voorbeeld van een besluitvormingsproces

Abstract

The boundaries of municipalities in the Netherlands can only be altered by act of parliament. The article describes the decision-making process which resulted in the Bijlmermeerpolder being provisionally added to the municipality of Amsterdam. Up till then, this polder had constituted part of a municipality near Amsterdam and was planned as a new residential area for about a 100,000 people. The problem was, should this project be realized as the responsibility of the Amsterdam city-government or as that of the authorities of a new municipality to be founded in die Bijlmermeerpolder. The city-government held the opinion that only the first solution could render satisfactory results and therefore campaigned for annexation. It was argued that only Amsterdam was technically and administratively equipped for this task. 1 he Minister of the Interior took the second view; he considered it in favour of local democracy to found a new and relatively small municipality. . The local authorities and pressure groups in Amsterdam and some directly interested municipalities tried to influence parliament and the parliamentary parties during the years of discussion on the repeatedly modified bill. The authors regard the administrative arrangement of an expending metropolitan area as a political problem, since the entire area is the scene of the economic, social and cultural life of the residents, whereas they are politically relevant in only part of it, namely the municipality they happen to live in. This problem was hardly touched upon in the discussion on the Bijlmermeerpolder. The dimension in the largest parliamentary group has contributed to the focusing of attention on technical and managerial matters. The decision which was finally reached may be considered as a specimen o incremental or marginal decision-making.