Belgian Society & Politics
1st Bachelor Social Sciences
Table of content: BE society
Chapter 2: History of Belgium
1. Union & separation of the low countries
a. 1830 split from the United Kingdom of the Netherlands
i. Religious differences
ii. Languge differences
2. The weight of history
a. Religion chirstianity
b. A monarchy appeasing the Vienna Congress
c. Language French chosen as official language
3. 1830-1848: consolidation & unionism
a. First parliament liberals and catholics
4. 1848-1893: The Social question and the Flemish question
a. Rise of labor movements & trade unions
i. First workers party in government in 1894 (suffrage extension)
b. Flemish wanting Dutch to be recognized as an official language
i. After incident in court court & administration in Dutch + formally allowed
in the N provinces
5. 1893-1918: The right to vote
a. Elected members of the workers party
b. Proportional voting system (saved liberals from dissapearing from the
electoral scene)
c. Equality law equal recognition of Dutch as official language
6. 1918 – 1945: more consociation & territorial division
a. Interbellum: governments of national unity (3 trad. Party families)
b. 1921: linguistic area’s defined language was tied to territory, 10 year
census
c. BE in WO2
i. Disagreement of government vs Leopold 3
7. 1945-1995: Towards a federal state
a. Can the king return? referendum King Bouduain appointed
b. During war foundations of the welfare state
c. 1960 +++ decisions of BE state structure
i. Freezing of the language border
ii. Language facilities
d. Economic centrum shifts from South to North
e. BE internationally
i. Congo’s independence
ii. BE joins the ECC
8. After…: A federation @ work
, a. 1995: 4 regional/community parliaments directly elected
i. Institutional design to govern a divided society
b. 2004: seperation of the regional and federal elections
9. Conclusion
a. 4 major turningpoints in history defined the futrue of BE
i. State formation: language conflict + conflict liberals vs catholics
ii. Reform of the electoral system: introducing the workers party
iii. Institutinalization of the territorial divide
iv. Shift of economic power from north to south: additional level of distrust
Chapter 3: Territorial organisation and
reorganization
1. The steps towards a federal solution…
a. Belgian is a centrifugal federation devolution of competences
b. The units of the federation ARE NOT historical building blocks!
i. Two entities have no history prior to BE
c. Lack of agreement on boundries
i. Census was abolished and language border fixed…
2. STEP 1: 1960: Freezing the language border
a. 1963: no constitutional reform but +++ decisions agreement of Val
Duchesse/Hertoginnendal
i. Froze language border
ii. Language facilities
3. STEP 2: 1970: the constitutional reform
a. Laid foundations for future federal BE
b. Defined procedure for future reforms
c. Fixed the formal existence of regions and communities
i. Regions territory
ii. Communities people
d. Division of language group = key for 3 protective measures
i. The alarm bell procedure
ii. Linguistic parity in the national government
iii. Special majority laws
e. Institutionalization of the power-sharing logic taking pressure of the
regionalist demands 2 language communities with autonomy and equal
veto powers at the central level
4. STEP 3: 1980: The refrom of 1980
a. Giving real meaning to regions and communities setting up insitutions
i. Parliamentary assemblies (NOT elected!)
ii. Government executive (NOT elected!)
iii. Still no agreement on BXL
5. STEP 4: A solution for BXL
a. BXL became a seperate region
i. Francophones
ii. Flemish
b. BXL can only be governed if the 2 language groups agree
, c. First directly elelcted sub-state parliament! 1988
6. STEP 5: the 1993 state reform “Saint-Michael” agreement
a. Made BE a REAL federal state
i. Direct election of regional parliaments
ii. Reform of the senate becomes senate of the communities
iii. Flemish Brabant seperated from Walloon Brabant
b. Regions and communities get more autonomy and more competences
7. STEP 6: Reforming the federation
a. Both N and S have different demands for further reform of the federation
b. 2001 expansion of some fiscal competences to the regions
c. More and more powers devolved to substate level…
8. The distribution of powers…
a. Regions competences of the territory
i. (area development work, agriculture, environment…)
b. Communities competences of the people
i. (education, culture, use of language…)
c. Federal level all residual powers
i. (court, international coorperation, security, …)
d. Competences come mostily in homogenous packages but overlap from time
to time
i. Competences on finance/employement shared between regional and
federal level
ii. Both regions and communities have competences of international
cooperation (within the limits of their competences)
9. The institutions of the federal state
a. @ substate level 5 federated entities
i. Walloon region
ii. Flanders (both region and community)
iii. German speaking community on regional matters under wallonia
iv. French speaking community closely linked to walloon region
v. BXL region
1. Can’t make decrees ordinances
2. Mixed an bilingual
b. +++ community levels are equally represented @ level of BXL
i. COCOF = defending matters of the French community
ii. VGC = flemish matters in BXL
iii. COCON/GGC = joined organisation
10.Financing the regions and communites
a. Up until 2002 redistribution of taxes collected @ federal level
b. Since 2002 more fiscal autonomy for the regions
c. Communities remain financed on the federal level overlap in BXL so is hard
to manage
i. Financial transfers
ii. Compensation for former shared taxes
iii. Fund linked to number of foreign students
11.Dealing with conflicst
a. Solidarity and cooperation between the levels is needed
, b. Some policies require cooperation between the levels intergovernmental
cooperation
c. Conflicts of competences settled in a judicary way
i. Before law: council of state
ii. After law: constitutional court
d. Conflicts of interest
i. Settled by concentration comittee
ii. Likely to occur between 2 communities
12.BE a peculiar federation
a. Federal state by default: unintentional, to avoid conflict
b. Unfinished federation: no agreement on where reforms are heading
c. Bipolar federation: 2 blocks, the Flemish and the Francophones
d. Consociational democracy: 2 segments with autonomy BUT power sharing @
central level
e. Centrifugal federatoin: competences alaways devolved to lower levels
f. Double federation: regions and communites
g. Assymetric federation: entities are not the same but interlinked
h. Complex federation: because of the assymetry
i. Dual federation: powers between central and substate level are clearly
divided “layered cake”
Chapter 4: Political parties
1. Introduction
a. BE= a partitocracy parties mobilize voters, core of electoral competition,
form government
2. The Christian democrats
a. Catholic party formed @ the end of the school conflict with the liberals
b. 1936: catholic block (2 parts) linguistic divide disapeared after WO2 split
agian in 1968 CVP and PSC
c. Electoral decline and consequences
i. PSC CDH (centre democrate humaniste) more left oriented
ii. CVP CD & V (christen democraten en vlaams) more regionalist/right
3. The socialists
a. Walloon wing more important
b. After WO2, socialist party often in alliance with the christian democrats =
natural governing coalitions (2 biggest parties of each side of the language
border)
c. 1978: split
i. PS (partie socialiste) big in Wallonia, relied heaviliy on workers movement
ii. Sp.A (socialistische partij anders) less close to trade unions
4. The communists
a. No big role in BE politics labour movement was well represented by the
socialists and christ dem (+ pillar organisations)
b. Stronger post WO2, communist resistance against the germans
c. Dropped post cold war
1st Bachelor Social Sciences
Table of content: BE society
Chapter 2: History of Belgium
1. Union & separation of the low countries
a. 1830 split from the United Kingdom of the Netherlands
i. Religious differences
ii. Languge differences
2. The weight of history
a. Religion chirstianity
b. A monarchy appeasing the Vienna Congress
c. Language French chosen as official language
3. 1830-1848: consolidation & unionism
a. First parliament liberals and catholics
4. 1848-1893: The Social question and the Flemish question
a. Rise of labor movements & trade unions
i. First workers party in government in 1894 (suffrage extension)
b. Flemish wanting Dutch to be recognized as an official language
i. After incident in court court & administration in Dutch + formally allowed
in the N provinces
5. 1893-1918: The right to vote
a. Elected members of the workers party
b. Proportional voting system (saved liberals from dissapearing from the
electoral scene)
c. Equality law equal recognition of Dutch as official language
6. 1918 – 1945: more consociation & territorial division
a. Interbellum: governments of national unity (3 trad. Party families)
b. 1921: linguistic area’s defined language was tied to territory, 10 year
census
c. BE in WO2
i. Disagreement of government vs Leopold 3
7. 1945-1995: Towards a federal state
a. Can the king return? referendum King Bouduain appointed
b. During war foundations of the welfare state
c. 1960 +++ decisions of BE state structure
i. Freezing of the language border
ii. Language facilities
d. Economic centrum shifts from South to North
e. BE internationally
i. Congo’s independence
ii. BE joins the ECC
8. After…: A federation @ work
, a. 1995: 4 regional/community parliaments directly elected
i. Institutional design to govern a divided society
b. 2004: seperation of the regional and federal elections
9. Conclusion
a. 4 major turningpoints in history defined the futrue of BE
i. State formation: language conflict + conflict liberals vs catholics
ii. Reform of the electoral system: introducing the workers party
iii. Institutinalization of the territorial divide
iv. Shift of economic power from north to south: additional level of distrust
Chapter 3: Territorial organisation and
reorganization
1. The steps towards a federal solution…
a. Belgian is a centrifugal federation devolution of competences
b. The units of the federation ARE NOT historical building blocks!
i. Two entities have no history prior to BE
c. Lack of agreement on boundries
i. Census was abolished and language border fixed…
2. STEP 1: 1960: Freezing the language border
a. 1963: no constitutional reform but +++ decisions agreement of Val
Duchesse/Hertoginnendal
i. Froze language border
ii. Language facilities
3. STEP 2: 1970: the constitutional reform
a. Laid foundations for future federal BE
b. Defined procedure for future reforms
c. Fixed the formal existence of regions and communities
i. Regions territory
ii. Communities people
d. Division of language group = key for 3 protective measures
i. The alarm bell procedure
ii. Linguistic parity in the national government
iii. Special majority laws
e. Institutionalization of the power-sharing logic taking pressure of the
regionalist demands 2 language communities with autonomy and equal
veto powers at the central level
4. STEP 3: 1980: The refrom of 1980
a. Giving real meaning to regions and communities setting up insitutions
i. Parliamentary assemblies (NOT elected!)
ii. Government executive (NOT elected!)
iii. Still no agreement on BXL
5. STEP 4: A solution for BXL
a. BXL became a seperate region
i. Francophones
ii. Flemish
b. BXL can only be governed if the 2 language groups agree
, c. First directly elelcted sub-state parliament! 1988
6. STEP 5: the 1993 state reform “Saint-Michael” agreement
a. Made BE a REAL federal state
i. Direct election of regional parliaments
ii. Reform of the senate becomes senate of the communities
iii. Flemish Brabant seperated from Walloon Brabant
b. Regions and communities get more autonomy and more competences
7. STEP 6: Reforming the federation
a. Both N and S have different demands for further reform of the federation
b. 2001 expansion of some fiscal competences to the regions
c. More and more powers devolved to substate level…
8. The distribution of powers…
a. Regions competences of the territory
i. (area development work, agriculture, environment…)
b. Communities competences of the people
i. (education, culture, use of language…)
c. Federal level all residual powers
i. (court, international coorperation, security, …)
d. Competences come mostily in homogenous packages but overlap from time
to time
i. Competences on finance/employement shared between regional and
federal level
ii. Both regions and communities have competences of international
cooperation (within the limits of their competences)
9. The institutions of the federal state
a. @ substate level 5 federated entities
i. Walloon region
ii. Flanders (both region and community)
iii. German speaking community on regional matters under wallonia
iv. French speaking community closely linked to walloon region
v. BXL region
1. Can’t make decrees ordinances
2. Mixed an bilingual
b. +++ community levels are equally represented @ level of BXL
i. COCOF = defending matters of the French community
ii. VGC = flemish matters in BXL
iii. COCON/GGC = joined organisation
10.Financing the regions and communites
a. Up until 2002 redistribution of taxes collected @ federal level
b. Since 2002 more fiscal autonomy for the regions
c. Communities remain financed on the federal level overlap in BXL so is hard
to manage
i. Financial transfers
ii. Compensation for former shared taxes
iii. Fund linked to number of foreign students
11.Dealing with conflicst
a. Solidarity and cooperation between the levels is needed
, b. Some policies require cooperation between the levels intergovernmental
cooperation
c. Conflicts of competences settled in a judicary way
i. Before law: council of state
ii. After law: constitutional court
d. Conflicts of interest
i. Settled by concentration comittee
ii. Likely to occur between 2 communities
12.BE a peculiar federation
a. Federal state by default: unintentional, to avoid conflict
b. Unfinished federation: no agreement on where reforms are heading
c. Bipolar federation: 2 blocks, the Flemish and the Francophones
d. Consociational democracy: 2 segments with autonomy BUT power sharing @
central level
e. Centrifugal federatoin: competences alaways devolved to lower levels
f. Double federation: regions and communites
g. Assymetric federation: entities are not the same but interlinked
h. Complex federation: because of the assymetry
i. Dual federation: powers between central and substate level are clearly
divided “layered cake”
Chapter 4: Political parties
1. Introduction
a. BE= a partitocracy parties mobilize voters, core of electoral competition,
form government
2. The Christian democrats
a. Catholic party formed @ the end of the school conflict with the liberals
b. 1936: catholic block (2 parts) linguistic divide disapeared after WO2 split
agian in 1968 CVP and PSC
c. Electoral decline and consequences
i. PSC CDH (centre democrate humaniste) more left oriented
ii. CVP CD & V (christen democraten en vlaams) more regionalist/right
3. The socialists
a. Walloon wing more important
b. After WO2, socialist party often in alliance with the christian democrats =
natural governing coalitions (2 biggest parties of each side of the language
border)
c. 1978: split
i. PS (partie socialiste) big in Wallonia, relied heaviliy on workers movement
ii. Sp.A (socialistische partij anders) less close to trade unions
4. The communists
a. No big role in BE politics labour movement was well represented by the
socialists and christ dem (+ pillar organisations)
b. Stronger post WO2, communist resistance against the germans
c. Dropped post cold war
