Dutch Chemical Society

He is also a member of the Royal Society of Chemistry, Royal Dutch Chemical Society, Society of Plastic Engineers and The Institute of Materials. 

Kruyt unfolded his agenda with the Dutch Chemical Society later in Herinneringen, Chemisch Weekblad, 25 (1928), 342-344. 

C.I. van Nieuwenburg, De Nationale Organisatie van Wetenschappelijk-Technisch Werk, Chemisch Weekblad, 17 (1920), 70-75. Van Nieuwenburg became professor of analytical chemistry at Delft polytechnic in 1920, after which his views on research lost some of their exclusive focus on industry. See for example his presidential speech at the 1924 meeting of the Dutch Chemical Society, Chemisch Weekblad, 21 (1924), 223-224. 

THE NETHERLANDS Keeping the Ranks Closed The Dutch Chemical Society, 1903-1914... 

All three waves will be discussed below in relation to the social history of Dutch chemistry. Compared to other European chemical societies the Dutch Chemical Society (Nederlandsche Chemische Vereeniging [NCV]) was founded rather late, in 1903. But earlier, local chemical societies existed. To a certain extent, the founding of a national society still belonged to the third wave of applied-chemical and profession-oriented societies, because, as we will see, chemists working in the (applied) analysis of foodstuffs and industrial products took the lead. But other organizational models - such as the influential Deutsche Chemische Gesellschaft, with many Dutch members - were available as well, and for a number of reasons already at its founding date the NCV had a hybrid character that combined elements of a science-oriented society with those of a profession-oriented one. 

In this chapter I will try to explain why the creation of the Dutch chemical society occurred relatively late, and why it took on a hybrid character from the start. We will show that the founding of the NCV was the result of a carefully negotiated equilibrium between different groups of chemists, and also that initial opposition within academic circles had to be overcome. In order to understand these peculiarities of the Dutch case, it is important to first tell more about the institutional and social development of chemistry in the Netherlands up to 1903. In the course of this historical sketch the mutual relations and conflicts between the different groups of chemical practitioners will become clear, and also why the NCV was not founded earlier. 

Why was the Dutch Chemical Society founded relatively late, and how can we explain the hybrid nature of the society These were the questions posed at the start of this chapter. I hope to have shown that there were several reasons for the late establishment of the NCV. In the first place, there was an extensive network of local scientific societies in the Netherlands that also paid attention to chemistry. This made it less urgent for academic chemists to found a national discipline-oriented society. Secondly, the Netherlands did not have a dominant metropolitan centre, and therefore there was no town whose local chemical society could develop into a national one. The fact that there were also tensions between the Amsterdam chemical school and the Leiden school was an extra reason why the initiative for a national society could not come from academic circles. The third, and final, reason for the late emergence of the NCV was the relatively late industrialization of the Netherlands, and the late expansion of applied chemical research. Only in the 1890s, when agricultural experimental stations and analytical laboratories flourished, and the number of chemical engineers grew rapidly, were the conditions fulfilled for the establishment of a profession-oriented chemical society. 

Dutch Chemical Society, see Nederlandsche Chemische Vereeniging Dutch Natural Science and Medical Congress, see Nederlandsch Natuur- en Geneeskundig Congres... 

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