C. A. Tamse – författare

The theme chosen for the seventh conference of Dutch and British historians - relations between Church and State in the two countries since the Reformation - cannot pretend to any originality. A subject so germane to the history of Europe, and indeed of those parts of the world colonized by Europeans and evangelized by the Christian churches, has naturally attracted the attention of numerous scholars. The particular attraction of this study of the action and reaction of Church and State in Britain and the Netherlands lies in the scope it offers historians and political scientists for making comparisons be­ tween two states, both of which endorsed the Protestant Reformation while rejecting absolutism. But the dissimilarities are quite as striking. In the Netherlands the Reformed Church came to hold a curiously equivocal position, being neither an established Church in the English sense nor an independent sect. Yet even after the formal separation of Church and State in 1796 and the rise to political prominence of Dutch Catholicism, ties of sentiment continued to link the Dutch nation and the Reformed Church for some time to come. Within England the Anglican Church maintained its constitutional standing as the established Church and its social position as the Church of the 'Establishment', though it had to recognize a non-episcopal estab­ lished Church of Scotland and accept its disestablishment in Ireland and Wales.

The theme chosen for the seventh conference of Dutch and British historians - relations between Church and State in the two countries since the Reformation - cannot pretend to any originality. A subject so germane to the history of Europe, and indeed of those parts of the world colonized by Europeans and evangelized by the Christian churches, has naturally attracted the attention of numerous scholars. The particular attraction of this study of the action and reaction of Church and State in Britain and the Netherlands lies in the scope it offers historians and political scientists for making comparisons be­ tween two states, both of which endorsed the Protestant Reformation while rejecting absolutism. But the dissimilarities are quite as striking. In the Netherlands the Reformed Church came to hold a curiously equivocal position, being neither an established Church in the English sense nor an independent sect. Yet even after the formal separation of Church and State in 1796 and the rise to political prominence of Dutch Catholicism, ties of sentiment continued to link the Dutch nation and the Reformed Church for some time to come. Within England the Anglican Church maintained its constitutional standing as the established Church and its social position as the Church of the ''Establishment'', though it had to recognize a non-episcopal estab­ lished Church of Scotland and accept its disestablishment in Ireland and Wales.

In the Survey of Recent Historical Works, which according to custom concludes this IXth volume of the Acta, is a notice of the recent ''Report of the Dutch research, with suggestions for future development''. Such a report could easily be classified as an attempt to bring pressure to bear on financial resources for support of a somewhat neglected branch of scientific effort, indeed as a symptom of the current disease of notatitis. A recent special issue ''Regeren door notas'', of the periodical Beleid and Maatschappij, March-April 1976, discusses this severe Dutch epidemic of official note-writing, for any purpose, on any matter, at any time, by any sort of official committee to any sort of official body. But even if such were the only reason for the production of this Report, which indeed it is not, the Report will stand on its own feet, as significant and of consequence. In general, however, this Report makes sad reading. It would seem that Dutch historical research and historiography lags far behind comparable foreign developments. There are said to be immense gaps in knowledge of and insight into virtually all fields of the Dutch past and moreover a total lack of modem sophistication. Inevitably, currently fashionable techniques such as programming, co-ordination, and teamwork are suggested as desirable, and a preference is expressed for the currently highly regarded socio-historical approach.