The Price of Prosperity? A Historical Account of Regulating Industrial Pollution in the Netherlands

Regulatory governance and state-corporate crime studies link persistent industrial pollution to long-term regulatory–industry interactions, yet little is known about how these interactions evolve and become entrenched. This article examines two enduring cases of industrial pollution in the Netherlands—Hoogovens/Tata Steel and DuPont de Nemours/Chemours—to explore how regulatory–industry interactions shape the emergence, normalization, and persistence of pollution. Based on historical archives of government and company documents and media publications, four time periods since the 1960s are studied. Using path dependency as an analytical lens, this article identifies five interdependent, recurring patterns that enabled and sustained harmful corporate conduct: knowledge-asymmetry, regulatory co-design, economic dependency, regulatory fragmentation, and juridification. The findings contribute to a more nuanced understanding of how regulatory-industry interactions can inadvertently facilitate enduring environmental harm, offering insight into structural dynamics that normalize pollution and complicate accountability and reform over time.