I IKE other Western capitals, Amsterdam has had its quota of student barricades, tear gas volleys and police baton charges. The youthful protesters, who used to be known as Provos (for provocateurs), rioted over almost everything from Crown Princess Beatrix's lavish wedding in 1966, when they tossed smoke bombs at the royal carriage, to the country's critical housing shortage. But new tactics were introduced early this year by the Kabouters, or Pixies, who decided that fun and games might be more effective than paving stones and smoke bombs.
Sporting pointed hats and led by ex-Provo Leader Roel van Duijn, 27, a bearded anarchist with a sense of humor, the Pixies established "people's departments" to handle a whole range of services. To protest air pollution, the Pixies' Environment Department stopped traffic by staging smiling street sit-ins —but only on Saturday afternoons when families go shopping in their cars. They introduced cartop flower boxes to beautify parking lots. Their Housing Department seized empty buildings, scrubbed them clean and opened them to some of the city's 15,000 homeless. They organized an Old-Age Department, offering lonely pensioners free services like shopping, painting or just chatting; no fewer than 350 old Amsterdamers called for help in a recent week. The Pixies frequently fight city hall—140 of them were arrested last month for refusing to clear out of an abandoned building—but they also joined it, in a way, by forming a political party.
Van Duijn's motto of "Sweetness, Flowers and Understanding" coupled with good deeds apparently won over many Dutch voters who had been growing impatient with youthful protesters. In city council elections throughout The Netherlands last week, the Pixies won two seats in The Hague and one each in Alkmaar, Arnhem and Leiden. Their greatest victory was in Amsterdam, where the Pixies polled close to 38,000 votes, won five seats on the 45-seat council, and established themselves as the fourth biggest political party in the city.