Labor & Greens Merge in Netherlands: A New Leftist Force To Be Reckoned With?

Accessed via WikiMedia, ProgressiefNederland, progressiefnederland.nl

(KUALA LAMPUR, MALAYSIA) — On 26 March 2026, the Labour Party and the Green-Left movement in the Netherlands announced that they would be merging the two parties together under the banner of Progressief Nederland [Progressive Netherlands] and abbreviated “PRO” on 13 June later this year. This is the culmination of half a decade’s worth of serious work being done on the national level of greater cooperation - and eventual unification of the two, although the idea has been floated since 2004, on presenting the Dutch voters with a left-wing alternative to the primarily right of centre governments led by the VVD [Volkspartij voor Vrijheid en Democratie] under former Prime Minister, and current Secretary-General of NATO Mark Rutter and now by D66 [Democraten 66] under Prime Minister Rob Jetten.

This article will address three main topics surrounding this development: the first would be the history and the evolution of the cooperation between both parties, the second would be the platforms of the two parties and the points of complement and agreement between them, and the third would be the analysis of the most recent federal elections held last year, and the path ahead.

Historical Context

As alluded to above, the idea of a possible merger started as early as 2004 when the then-mayor of Amsterdam and later PvdA (Labour) leader, Job Cohen, called for a merger of Labour, Groen-Links (the Greens) and the Socialist Party (SP), a left-wing soft-eurosceptic conservative party. However, this never materialised, particularly on the part of the Socialist Party since they’re more anti-capitalist, eurosceptic and “principled” where they view Labour as a bourgeois party and cooperation with them is seen as a betrayal of left-wing principles.

The more serious cooperation between the Greens and Labour began after Labour’s catastrophic defeat in the 2017 general election, where the party lost 29 seats and saw its vote share fall to 5.7%. This collapse was largely attributed to its participation in a coalition government with the VVD, during which austerity measures and welfare reforms alienated much of its traditional working-class base. In addition, the broader European migrant crisis contributed to political pressures that further weakened the party’s support.

Both Labour and the Greens understood and realised that the left was fractured, and they sought to remedy this by gradually cooperating with one another. They increasingly voted together on issues in the States General (Dutch Parliament) - forming a clear centre-left, socially liberal and progressive bloc in opposition to the liberal parties like the VVD or Geert Wilders’ far-right PVV [Partij voor de Vrijheid].

After the 2021 elections which yielded yet another disappointing result from both parties, members from both Labour and the Greens formed an inter-party group known as “Rood-Groen” which translates to Red-Green - an interest group that is willing to foster greater cooperation between the “Reds” (Labour) and the “Green” (Greens), and eventually a merger of the two. Members in this group would propose motions in their respective parties towards a deeper cooperation. During the Government Formations of 2021-2022, party leaders Lilianne Ploumen (Labour) and Jesse Klaver (Greens) made it clear to Mark Rutte that they will not enter the government coalition unless the other party joined - and when Rutte refused to include the left-wing alliance, what he coined as a ‘linkse wolk’ [left-wing cloud], they decided to cooperate more as a left-wing opposition bloc in the States General - eventually forming an electoral alliance, at least on the national level, known as GL/PvdA - and it pays off.

In the two elections that followed, the alliance won 25 seats in 2023 but slumped a bit to 20 seats in 2025, but it was still greater than what they collectively had at the 2021 election, at 17 seats. However, just before the election of 2025, a referendum was proposed in both parties for a decision in principle about the founding of a new party comprised of Labour and the Greens - and they voted for it by “Assad margins”, with 89.1% of Greens voters and 88% of Labour voters voting for the motion.

Platforms

The political platforms of both parties work in complement to each other. The Labour Party is a social democratic party whose key priorities are the priorities of every traditional European social democratic party - Stronger Labour Rights, Support for Unions, Progressive Taxation, Stronger Safety Nets, Investments in public services. As such, just like all other European social democratic parties, their traditional base is the labour unions and working class folk, which gave the Labour Party its foundations in the first place.

They’re historically strong amongst public sector workers, lower income workers and the education level is more mixed, with some only having mid-level education, while some do have higher education, which indicates that in addition to their public position as economically left, they’re also more moderate on cultural wars in general.

By contrast, the Greens’ central focus is on, very understandably, the environment, with them favoring policies which emphasize rapid decarbonization, public investments in renewable energy and stronger climate regulation. Their policy platform also includes strong support for LGBTQ+ rights, anti-discrimination measures and more inclusive policies for ethnic minorities and, by extension, immigrants.

They are more socially progressive than Labour, which shows where their electorate truly is. The Greens are strongest amongst the highly-educated youth and public sector professions like professors and creative industries, which are more open, accepting and sometimes more unabashed in defending and supporting culturally progressive issues - much to the distaste of the more culturally moderate or even conservative members of society.

A merger of these two parties would rebuild the left coalition: between the old left and the new left. The old left tend to be demographically older, perhaps less educated, more union-heavy workers and more focused on economic security and class politics. Meanwhile, the new left tend to be more interested in climate and identity politics with a more progressive cultural stance and a higher education target. This gives this new party three main advantages, which are: full generational coverage, appeal to a wider audience and a more sophisticated platform which merges climate and diversity with equality and welfare. Together, they form a broad, modern left coalition spanning class, age, and education divides.

2025 Dutch General Elections

As mentioned previously, the 2025 general election did not yield the best results for the centre-left alliance, with them only achieving 20 seats and 12.8% of the vote - however parliamentary group leader Jesse Klaver, and the inaugural leader of Progressief Nederland, achieving the de facto status of Leader of the Opposition since there is no mechanism in the Netherlands for such a role - but this puts the new Progressif Nederland in pole position to showcase what they are proposing and opposing as a de facto Government-in-waiting.

The election overall was very fragmented, with the largest party, D66, only winning 26 out of the 150 seats in the Dutch Lower House, which is the first time that the largest party has obtained fewer than 30 seats in Dutch Parliamentary History.

This was a turning point for the alliance, because their candidate at the top of the ticket, Frans Timmermans, resigned after two election defeats in a row. He had a major issue - he was seen as too technocratic and out of touch with regular people, who perceived him as having different priorities for the country. With Jesse Klaver now at the top of a ticket, a fresh and younger face may be just what the centre-left needs to revitalise and energise that voter base and rebuild the left once more.