The second Van Agt cabinet was the executive branch of the Dutch Government from 11 September 1981 until 29 May 1982. The cabinet was formed by the christian-democratic Christian Democratic Appeal (CDA), the social-democratic Labour Party (PvdA) and the social-liberal Democrats 66 (D'66) after the election of 1981. The cabinet was a Centre-left grand coalition and had a substantial majority in the House of Representatives with Christian-Democratic Leader Dries van Agt serving as Prime Minister. Former Labour Prime Minister Joop den Uyl the Labour Leader served as Deputy Prime Minister, Minister of Social Affairs and Employment and was given the portfolio of Netherlands Antilles Affairs, Progressive-Liberal Leader Jan Terlouw served as Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Economic Affairs.
The cabinet served in the early years of the turbulent 1980s. Domestically it had to deal with the 1980s recession and a growing inflation but it was able to implement a major social reform to social security. The cabinet suffered several major internal conflicts between the cabinet members of the Christian Democratic Appeal and the Labour Party, especially the poor working relationship between Prime Minister Van Agt and Deputy Prime Minister Den Uyl which lead to the fall of the cabinet just 243 days into its term on 12 May 1982 with the Labour Party cabinet members resigning on 29 May 1982 and the cabinet was replaced with the caretaker Third Van Agt cabinet.