Alexandre Afonso
@alexandreafonso.bsky.social
Associate professor at Leiden University. Political economy, migration, welfare states 🇨🇭🇵🇹 🇳🇱 http://alexandreafonso.me
Perhaps some of the Netherlands' housing problems would not be so acute if everyone didn't want to live in a max. 2 or 3-storey terraced house like the Brits, but rather in a flat in a larger building (say 5-6 floors), like the Germans or the Swiss?
November 3, 2025 at 10:06 AM
Perhaps some of the Netherlands' housing problems would not be so acute if everyone didn't want to live in a max. 2 or 3-storey terraced house like the Brits, but rather in a flat in a larger building (say 5-6 floors), like the Germans or the Swiss?
Just discovered the existence of this 💥🚨Portuguese martial art💥🚨🥷 called Jogo do Pau.
November 2, 2025 at 12:20 PM
Just discovered the existence of this 💥🚨Portuguese martial art💥🚨🥷 called Jogo do Pau.
Reposted by Alexandre Afonso
October 31, 2025 at 6:50 PM
Reposted by Alexandre Afonso
Visualized here. Hot tip for journalists: the real question isn’t why Wilders lost, but why the far right has consolidated — despite Wilders's ineffectiveness in government.
October 30, 2025 at 1:55 PM
Visualized here. Hot tip for journalists: the real question isn’t why Wilders lost, but why the far right has consolidated — despite Wilders's ineffectiveness in government.
Reposted by Alexandre Afonso
I have just written a Substack piece with some scenarios of what would have happened in the recent Dutch election if there had been 4% electoral threshold (with apologies to my Dutch friends for banging on about this!) substack.com/home/post/p-...
What Would happen if The Netherlands had a 4% Electoral Threshold?
Political scientists of electoral systems love The Netherlands.
substack.com
October 31, 2025 at 3:03 PM
I have just written a Substack piece with some scenarios of what would have happened in the recent Dutch election if there had been 4% electoral threshold (with apologies to my Dutch friends for banging on about this!) substack.com/home/post/p-...
Nice that you are all energised by the dynamism of a young, good looking progressive centrist. Now let me introduce you to the approval rating of Emmanuel Macron.
October 31, 2025 at 8:38 AM
Nice that you are all energised by the dynamism of a young, good looking progressive centrist. Now let me introduce you to the approval rating of Emmanuel Macron.
An interesting argument I have heard in the coverage of the Dutch election is that Wilders may not be unhappy about having a smaller representation in parliament, because he did not like having a large ragtag group of inexperienced and unreliable MPs that he could not control.
October 30, 2025 at 10:53 AM
An interesting argument I have heard in the coverage of the Dutch election is that Wilders may not be unhappy about having a smaller representation in parliament, because he did not like having a large ragtag group of inexperienced and unreliable MPs that he could not control.
Not that it matters a great deal, but Wilders's PVV has taken over as biggest party ahead of D66 in the latest count. Difference is 3000 votes, both have 26 seats.
October 30, 2025 at 10:22 AM
Not that it matters a great deal, but Wilders's PVV has taken over as biggest party ahead of D66 in the latest count. Difference is 3000 votes, both have 26 seats.
Reposted by Alexandre Afonso
🗳️ First exit polls from the Netherlands: Wilders’ PVV appears to shrink from 37 to 25 seats. Make no mistake — the far right remains strong. Support hasn’t disappeared; it’s shifted across parties. The Dutch political landscape is more fragmented than ever — and the far right is no exception. 🇳🇱
October 29, 2025 at 9:43 PM
🗳️ First exit polls from the Netherlands: Wilders’ PVV appears to shrink from 37 to 25 seats. Make no mistake — the far right remains strong. Support hasn’t disappeared; it’s shifted across parties. The Dutch political landscape is more fragmented than ever — and the far right is no exception. 🇳🇱
Only about half of the voters who voted Wilders in 2023 voted for him again.
October 29, 2025 at 9:35 PM
Only about half of the voters who voted Wilders in 2023 voted for him again.
Also, the Netherlands may soon have its first gay PM in Rob Jetten, leader of D66.
October 29, 2025 at 9:33 PM
Also, the Netherlands may soon have its first gay PM in Rob Jetten, leader of D66.
Reposted by Alexandre Afonso
Frans Timmermans has just resigned as leader of the Greens/Labour alliance, following a poor election performance.
October 29, 2025 at 9:00 PM
Frans Timmermans has just resigned as leader of the Greens/Labour alliance, following a poor election performance.
Good to remind people today that the Netherlands has an über-proportional electoral system with only one electoral district: it means that you only need 0,67% (100%/150 seats) of the national vote to get a seat. It makes it possible for even very small parties to get seats.
October 29, 2025 at 8:49 PM
Good to remind people today that the Netherlands has an über-proportional electoral system with only one electoral district: it means that you only need 0,67% (100%/150 seats) of the national vote to get a seat. It makes it possible for even very small parties to get seats.
🚨💥Exit poll for Dutch parliamentary election of today: serious chance that the liberal Democrats of D66 come first ahead of Wilders. Sort of a surprise given previous polls
October 29, 2025 at 8:06 PM
🚨💥Exit poll for Dutch parliamentary election of today: serious chance that the liberal Democrats of D66 come first ahead of Wilders. Sort of a surprise given previous polls
Is there any regulatory reason why these slogans have to be so bland or vacuous ("vote for us", "together forward",...) or are all these parties (24, 15 of which hold seats) just exhausted and not even trying?
October 19, 2025 at 9:55 AM
Is there any regulatory reason why these slogans have to be so bland or vacuous ("vote for us", "together forward",...) or are all these parties (24, 15 of which hold seats) just exhausted and not even trying?
But we in the Netherlands *absolutely* need 3 Christian parties, 3 radical-right parties, a party of the farmers, and a party for the animals!
NL needs an electoral threshold, eg. 4% (as in Sweden). It would encourage smaller parties to merge, voters to coordinate around medium and larger parties, and make coalition formation easier, governments more stable, and improve governability overall.
Come on guys, Europe needs you to do this!
Come on guys, Europe needs you to do this!
The Peilingwijzer poll of polls for the Netherlands has been updated to include the latest poll of Ipsos I&O.
📊 📈 All graphs & figures: https://peilingwijzer.tomlouwerse.nl/
Source Ipsos I&O: https://is.gd/35hl01
📊 📈 All graphs & figures: https://peilingwijzer.tomlouwerse.nl/
Source Ipsos I&O: https://is.gd/35hl01
October 17, 2025 at 2:44 PM
But we in the Netherlands *absolutely* need 3 Christian parties, 3 radical-right parties, a party of the farmers, and a party for the animals!
Reposted by Alexandre Afonso
1st article from my dissertation is out in Perspectives today!!
two takeaways: a) knowledge economy 'winners' may not be subject to status loss but they sure care about status preservation & b) this is consequential for their attitudes re: immigration & diversity.
Thnx 2 all along this journey!!
two takeaways: a) knowledge economy 'winners' may not be subject to status loss but they sure care about status preservation & b) this is consequential for their attitudes re: immigration & diversity.
Thnx 2 all along this journey!!
#OpenAccess from @poppublicsphere.bsky.social -
The Politics of Status Preservation: Immigration and the Knowledge Economy Class - https://cup.org/3VYHxGx
- @briittavs.bsky.social
#FirstView
The Politics of Status Preservation: Immigration and the Knowledge Economy Class - https://cup.org/3VYHxGx
- @briittavs.bsky.social
#FirstView
October 10, 2025 at 1:17 PM
1st article from my dissertation is out in Perspectives today!!
two takeaways: a) knowledge economy 'winners' may not be subject to status loss but they sure care about status preservation & b) this is consequential for their attitudes re: immigration & diversity.
Thnx 2 all along this journey!!
two takeaways: a) knowledge economy 'winners' may not be subject to status loss but they sure care about status preservation & b) this is consequential for their attitudes re: immigration & diversity.
Thnx 2 all along this journey!!
Big coup for Uni. Zurich and Switzerland, one of the few European countries that can compete with US academic salaries.
We are thrilled to welcome Esther Duflo and Abhijit Banerjee as the new Lemann Foundation Professors to our department, beginning in the summer of 2026.
October 10, 2025 at 10:33 AM
Big coup for Uni. Zurich and Switzerland, one of the few European countries that can compete with US academic salaries.
ik snap helemaal waarom journalisten willen dat iedereen "in gesprek" gaat, want het is in hun eigen belang om er een show van te maken
Over Volt en hun terechte weigering met complotdenkers en extreemrechtse influencers in debat te willen. Het normaliseren van extreemrechts is een groter kwaad dan het uitsluiten van leugenaars.
October 9, 2025 at 2:31 PM
ik snap helemaal waarom journalisten willen dat iedereen "in gesprek" gaat, want het is in hun eigen belang om er een show van te maken
Reposted by Alexandre Afonso
The communism of capital strikes again!
What makes LLMs work as a business is precisely that all this text is decommodified, free. As they themselves say, they'd have to shut down if they had to pay for their trainging data. Yet all that data is the product of human labor. This cutting edge of capitalism rests on a substrate of communism.
October 4, 2025 at 6:08 AM
The communism of capital strikes again!
The description of Nuno Espirito Santo as the only "black coach" in the Premier League shows how much race is a social construct. I wonder if anyone identified him as black when he was young and had hair? www.bbc.com/sport/footba...
October 4, 2025 at 2:24 PM
The description of Nuno Espirito Santo as the only "black coach" in the Premier League shows how much race is a social construct. I wonder if anyone identified him as black when he was young and had hair? www.bbc.com/sport/footba...
Reposted by Alexandre Afonso
As the Netherlands grapples with the "anglicisation" of its universities, it's worth looking to Flanders for a potential cautionary tale. This piece in De Tijd shows how a well-intentioned policy to protect Dutch in higher education can become absurd www.tijd.be/politiek-eco...
Is er ook Engelse master? Dan telt verplichte Nederlandstalige variant vaak geen enkele student
In het hoger onderwijs zitten meer studenten in de Engelstalige STEM-masteropleidingen dan in de Nederlandstalige. De Vlaamse regering wil die verengelsing tegengaan, maar dat leidt tot kafkaiaanse t...
www.tijd.be
October 2, 2025 at 7:08 PM
As the Netherlands grapples with the "anglicisation" of its universities, it's worth looking to Flanders for a potential cautionary tale. This piece in De Tijd shows how a well-intentioned policy to protect Dutch in higher education can become absurd www.tijd.be/politiek-eco...
Reposted by Alexandre Afonso
• Children of PhD-educated parents are 28 times more likely to become professors than those whose parents only completed compulsory school.
• Children of professors are 11 times more likely to join the faculty than everyone else.
• Children of professors are 11 times more likely to join the faculty than everyone else.
October 2, 2025 at 7:58 PM
• Children of PhD-educated parents are 28 times more likely to become professors than those whose parents only completed compulsory school.
• Children of professors are 11 times more likely to join the faculty than everyone else.
• Children of professors are 11 times more likely to join the faculty than everyone else.
This is fascinating.
Inequalities also vary by field.
⚖️ Law and 🩺 medicine stand out as the most selective by family background, with about 70% of faculty having university-educated parents.
These fields show especially limited representation from low-SES families.
⚖️ Law and 🩺 medicine stand out as the most selective by family background, with about 70% of faculty having university-educated parents.
These fields show especially limited representation from low-SES families.
October 2, 2025 at 8:20 PM
This is fascinating.