The Edmund Burke Foundation was founded in 2000 by a group of young conservatives, including professor Andreas Kinneging and journalist Bart Jan Spruyt, dissatisfied with the consensus of Dutch politics, the level of public debate and what they believe is the dangerous drift of philosophy and culture in the Netherlands.
Speakers at the foundation's events included Roger Scruton, the Burke scholar Peter Stanlis, Dutch writer Leon de Winter, Islam-expert Reuel Marc Gerecht, Frits Bolkestein and Onno Ruding, former finance minister of The Netherlands.
Consequently, Bart Jan Spruyt stepped back as full-time managing director of the think tank to join the political party of Geert Wilders, but remained a member of the governing Board of the Foundation.
In its think tank period, the Burke Foundation regularly published reports and studies on a variety of topics, including the Dutch health care sector, privatization, wasteful government spending and conservative philosophy and thought.
The Foundation received substantial support during its think-tank period from a variety of sources, including small private donors, Dutch entrepreneurs, and various multinational corporations, such as Pfizer and Microsoft.