This book is about an art in which the Netherlands excels: strategic planning. Foreign observers will need little convincing of the merits of Dutch planning. They will want to know whether routine explanations (small country, industrious, disciplined people hardened by the perennial fight against the sea) hold any water, and they will want to know where to look for the bag of tricks of Dutch planners. Dutch readers need to be convinced first that planning in the Netherlands is indeed effective before contemplating how this has come about. Our message for both is that, to the extent that Dutch...