I can answer for the Dutch Republic at least. There are several high-quality general surveys of the period that sketch in the social history of the period very adequately - two good places to start are Jonathan Israel’s magisterial The Dutch Republic: Its Rise, Greatness and Fall, 1477-1806 (Oxford: Oxford University Press 1998) and Simon Schama's The Embarrassment of Riches: an Interpretation of Dutch Culture in the Golden Age (London: Fontana, 1991).

On the specifics of daily life, see by AT van Deursen, Plain Lives in a Golden Age: Popular Culture, Religion and Society in Seventeenth Century Holland (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991). Further details of day-to-day life are added by Paul Zumthor, Daily Life in Rembrandt’s Holland (London: Weidenfeld and Nicholson, 1962). Amsterdam is covered in detail by Geoffrey Cotterell, Amsterdam: the Life of a City (Farnborough: DC Heath, 1973).

One point well worth making is that it is often travellers' accounts that provide the most interesting and insightful details of the way in which a society was structured and organised itself – many of the most fascinating details were considered too commonplace to be worthy of comment by the Dutch themselves. So it is also well worth while taking in travel narratives. Among the most entertaining is William Brereton's Travels in Holland, the United Provinces etc... 1634-1635 (London: Chetham Society, 1844). It's also worth checking out the relevant sections of Fynes Morrison's first-years-of-the-seventeenth-century An Itinerary Containing His Ten Yeeres Travell Through the Twelve Dominions of Germany, Bohmerland, Sweitzerland, Netherland, Denmarke, Poland, Italy, Turkey, France, England, Scotland & Ireland (4 vols, Glasgow: James MacLehose & Sons, 1907).

Among contemporary authors, the greatest authority was generally reckoned to be Sir William Temple, whose Observations Upon the United Provinces of the Netherlands did not, unfortunately, appear until 1673. This short book was, nevertheless, based on the author’s observations during visits dating back to 1652, and as Temple was for some time the English ambassador to the United Provinces, and took a keen professional interest in the reasons for Dutch success, his work is far more thoughtful and analytical than the muddled impressions of travellers, as well as being considerably less superficial.