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Together with several other northern European countries, the Netherlands is seen as one of the leaders in innovative environmental policy. Unfortunately, the actual policy results do not always justify this reputation. Recent signs suggest however that the Netherlands is beginning to practise what it preaches. One notable development is the incorporation of the findings of the report "Our Common Future" into a National Environmental Policy Plan. Another is the renewal of relationships between environmental authorities and their target groups, resulting in the establishment of covenants and other voluntary agreements. This renewal has also been a source of inspiration for the fifth environmental action programme of the EU.

Looking solely at the legislation, one could claim that the Dutch higher education system has been officially known as a binary system since 1986. At that moment the higher professional education sector was taken out of secondary education and received separate legislation (HBO Act), formally becoming part of higher education. However, one could also argue that the general idea of the existence of two sectors of higher education is much older and can be traced back to the beginning of the previous century, when the Domestic Science and Technical Education Act was established in 1919. The year 1968 stands for another hallmark in the development of the sector of higher professional education: the sector was integrated with secondary education as a result of the Secondary Education Act. At present the 1993 Higher Education and Research Act (WHW) regulates the higher education system, comprising thirteen universities, the Open University and (at present) 62 hogescholen. Table 4.1 gives an overview of the enrolments (total number of students) per sector. Both in total number of students and number of first-years students, the hogescholen sector is larger than the university sector.