Christianity, neutrality and public schooling: The origins of the Dutch educational system, 1801-1920

INTRODUCTION. In the Netherlands, The first national law on education dates back to 1801. It laid the foundation for a system of public education that was accessible to children of all denominations: Protestant, Catholic, and Jewish. The identity of public schools was based on general Christian principles, while the teaching of religious doctrines was a task for religious organisations. But in time the interpretation of the legal objective for public education has changed.
METHOD. In this article we follow the discussion about this objective and its translation into educational practice in the period 1801-1920. We use primary and secondary sources from the period under study.
RESULTS. In the first decades of the 19th Century, the system was criticised by orthodox Protestant and Catholic groups that were unhappy with the pedagogical practice of public schools, being not Protestant enough on one side, and too Protestant on the other. Politically this matter was resolved with the Constitution of 1848 in which the principle of freedom of education was laid down. In the following years, private-denominational schools slowly became part of the Dutch educational system, but their number increased substantially after the new Constitution of 1920 that provided equal financial support for private-denominational and public schools. During this process of denominational privatisation of the educational system, the public schools lost their majority position, while their pedagogical practices turned towards religious and political neutrality.
DISCUSSION. All this resulted in a remarkable fact: nowadays the Netherlands have an educational system with the smallest percentage of public schools in the world and the highest percentage of private-denominational schools.