Akademik

   The assembly of representatives of the provin cial States and other corporations, summoned upon occasion to de liberate with the sovereign on financial and other important issues. Its first meeting took place in 1464, at the request of the Burgundian duke Philip the Good (1419–1467). The States General became the main political body in the United Northern Provinces, which re nounced their sovereign, King Philip IIof Spain, in 1581. The States General deliberated on subjects of common interest: the Union, reli gion, and defense. Important resolutions were adopted only by una nimity, which slowed the process of decision making considerably. The assemblies of the seven provinces became sovereign bodies. After the Batavian Revolution in 1795, the States General was replaced by a National Assembly on the French model, but was re stored as a bicameral Parliament in 1815 after the founding of the monarchy and the proclamation of a constitution. Political parties in the modern sense emerged only in the 1870s.