Partition of Belgium
Encyclopedia
The partition of Belgium, or the dissolution of the Belgian state
through the separation of the Dutch-speaking
people of the Flanders region
and Brussels
from the French-speaking
people of the Walloon region and Brussels
, granting them either independence or respective accession to the Netherlands
and France
, is currently being discussed in the Belgian and international media. The concept is rooted in the long-standing ethnic, linguistic and socio-economic tensions between the two communities as well as the geographic and cultural continuity of Wallonia with France and that of Flanders with the Netherlands.
ish states are collectively called the Low Countries
. They emerged at the end of the Middle Ages
as a set of more or less independent fiefdom
s loosely linked to the Kingdom of France
and the Holy Roman Empire
. The southern part of this region — the Southern Netherlands
, the Prince-Bishopric of Liège, the Imperial Abbey of Stavelot-Malmedy and the Duchy of Bouillon — was partitioned both politically (into many fiefdoms), and linguistically (into the Romanic
and Germanic
Sprachräume
). The feudal borders did not match the linguistic borders, and some fiefdoms were divided into Francophone and Germanic regions. However, the ruling aristocracy, which usually spoke languages other than the population, did not much bother about these language-related disparities. After the 1581 secession of the Dutch Republic
in the northern Low Countries, French progressively emerged in the Southern Netherlands
under the influence of the Habsburg
nobility and, later, of the French invasions, as the upper class
language, not only at the court but also in the administration and in the political circles.
Antagonism between speakers of French and Dutch increased after the independence of Belgium
in 1830, when residents of the Southern Netherlands and their exclusively French-speaking political elite rebelled against the newfound hegemony of the northern provinces of the United Kingdom of the Netherlands
. Major European powers were divided in opinion over the fallout of the revolution. Ultimately, the state of Belgium, composed of provinces of both French-speaking and Dutch-speaking people, gained independence as a buffer state
between France and the Netherlands. French became the sole official language
. Dutch speakers demanded equal rights beginning in the late 19th century, but these were only introduced gradually throughout the 20th century. While postage stamps became bilingual in 1893, it was not until 1967 that an official Dutch version of the Constitution
was accepted. Since independence, socio-economic imbalances
have fueled resentment between the two communities.
Since the 1960s, separate regions have been created based on the country's linguistic division. As a result, minorities in certain areas (in and around Brussels and along the language border) claim to be disenfranchised in local government and services. Along with the usual left–right political division, there is also a linguistic division, causing a double party system which complicates coalition creation on the national level. The recent crisis over the formation of a coalition government
in the aftermath of the 2007 elections
, coupled with the unsolved problem of the Brussels-Halle-Vilvoorde
electoral district and the rise of extremist political parties, has given a fresh impetus to the issue, with recent opinion polls showing sizable support for a partition. However, support for a unified state remains among the majority of Belgium's people. Unitarists claim that the monarchy, strong national institutions, and the geopolitical importance of the linguistically and ethnically mixed Brussels
serve as unifying elements, while separatists rather claim these factors (and the considerable state debt
) serve merely as obstacles to an inevitable partition. Some political observers have suggested that a possible partition of Belgium may be a blow to the European Union
model of diverse cultures working together.
As no census
exists, there are no official statistics on Belgium's three official languages or their dialects. Various criteria, including the language(s) of parents, of education, or the second-language status of foreign born, may affect suggested figures. An estimated 59% of the Belgian population speaks Dutch
(often colloquially referred to as Flemish
), and French
is spoken by 40%. Total Dutch speakers number 6.23 million, concentrated in the northern Flanders
region, while French speakers comprise 3.32 million in Wallonia and an estimated 870,000 or 85%, of the officially bilingual Brussels-Capital Region. The German-speaking Community
is made up of 73,000 people in the east of Wallonia; around 10,000 German and 60,000 Belgian nationals are speakers of German
. Roughly 23,000 more of German speakers live in municipalities near the official Community.
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The Capital Region having bilingual status obliges its authorities to attend to people and organisations in French or Dutch language as these prefer, and to show street names in both languages on the plates, but does not allow a bilingual school as education belongs to either the French Community
or the Flemish one. Geographically, it is an enclave in the Flemish Region though near Wallonia. Constitutionally, it is a politically-distinct Region, while within its boundaries both the Flemish and French Communities exercise their authority. Historically, the local language of Brussels was Dutch
, and Dutch remained the vernacular language of a majority of inhabitants until around 1950. Now Dutch is mainly spoken by approximately 150,000 residents, or a 15% minority at most. The city has strong economic ties with surrounding Flanders, and many Dutch-speakers commute to Brussels for work, but at the same time the expanding suburbs of Brussels led to a majority of French-speakers in six Flemish villages.
The territory of Belgium is the southern part of the historical region called Low Countries
. The Low Countries emerged at the end of the Middle Ages as a very loose political confederation
of fiefdom
s ruled in personal union
by the House of Habsburg: the Seventeen Provinces
. The largest components of this union were the Duchy of Brabant
, the County of Flanders
, the County of Hainaut
and the Duchy of Luxembourg
. The Prince-Bishopric of Liège was almost an enclave within the Seventeen Provinces. The prince-bishopric was not formally included in the Habsburgs' dominion but was, since Emperor Charles V
, strongly influenced by its Habsburg neighbors. The border which emerged after the Dutch Revolt
and the Eighty Years' War split the Seventeen Provinces into the Dutch Republic
and the Spanish Netherlands. In particular Brabant and Flanders were divided into northern and southern components. Though the different fiefdoms building the Southern Netherlands were more or less ruled by one reigning House only, all of them were quite distinct of each other. Different traditions and dialects of Dutch
and Walloon
appeared. Within the largest fiefdoms like Liège, Flanders and Luxembourg, several distinct languages and dialects were in use.
The feudal borders partitioning Belgium during the Ancien Régime have nothing in common with the partitioning lines which currently separate the Belgian federal entities. The French disbanded these feudal entities and replaced them by departments during the French occupation from 1794 to 1815. The new entities or departments mirrored, approximately, the language border. For instance the new division separated the bilingual kernel of the Prince-Bishopric of Liège into two more or less monolingual regions. The only major exceptions were the bilingual Dyle and Forêts
departments. The departments would eventually become the provinces of the United Kingdom of the Netherlands
and later on of Belgium
. The name of the provinces
were inspired by the roughly corresponding medieval fiefdoms. In particular, the Dyle department became the province of Brabant
, that is the most southern part of the older duchy of Brabant.
In 1815, the territory now constituting Belgium was incorporated into the United Kingdom of the Netherlands
, which had been created to rehabilitate and consolidate the former Seventeen Provinces and serve as a buffer
against any expansionist ambitions of France. However, this placed the Catholic Belgian provinces, including French-speaking Wallonia, under Dutch-majority rule and a Calvinist
Dutch king. The Belgians had little influence over their lives and resented Dutch control and domination over economic, political and social institutions, sentiment that culminated in revolution in 1830.
Major European powers (which included France, Prussia
and the United Kingdom
) were divided over their response to the revolution of the Belgian people against the Dutch royal authorities. France favored the secession of Belgium from the Netherlands, hoping to annex all or at least part of the area, which was also the aim of most of the Belgian insurgents. After this proposal had been rejected by the other European powers, which supported the continued union of the Netherlands, Talleyrand, the French ambassador to the United Kingdom, proposed a partition of the Southern Netherlands
(most areas of modern Belgium). To this end, the parts of the provinces of Liège
, of Limburg and of Namur
east of the Meuse river as well as the cities of Maastricht and Liège and the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg would go to Prussia
. Part of the province of East Flanders
, nearly all of the province of Brabant, the province of Hainaut and the province of Namur west of the Meuse would be assigned to France. The province of Antwerp
— except the city of Antwerp itself — and the province of Limburg, west of the Meuse
river — except Maastricht
— would remain with the Netherlands, as would a small part of the province of Brabant, the former Oranje Lordship of Diest
. West Flanders, most of East Flanders, including Zeeuws-Vlaanderen
, and the city of Antwerp were to form the Free State of Antwerp, under British protection.
However, this plan was rejected and Belgium was established as an essential buffer state to check the ambitions of France. Wallonia and Flanders were unified as one state under a German prince, Leopold I
of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha. A historian of the Belgian revolution said that "in Belgium, there are parties and provinces, but no nation. Like a tent erected for one night, the new monarchy, after sheltering us from the tempest, will disappear without a trace."
The language border
separating the Germanic and Romance sprachraum
s moved over the centuries which preceded the establishment of the Belgian state over an area between the Ardennes
and the more or less straight line going from Aachen
to Calais
on the one hand and the much less populated frontier from Aachen
to Arlon via Malmedy
. However this frontier has not much changed since the 18th century. For example, in the communes of Mouscron
-Comines-Warneton
, French seems to be dominant at least since 1761. The frontier splitting the older province of Brabant and the Hesbaye
moved regularly during the 17th and 18th centuries. Some communes, such as Hélécine
, switched from Dutch to French and others, such as Herstappe
, switched from French to Dutch. The Voeren have a long Flemish tradition and, in the Land of Herve
, several communes which used to use Germanic dialects switched to French during the 18th century, as for example, Berneau and Warsage, both now part of Dalhem
and Saint-Jean-Sart, a hamlet
of Aubel
.
Prior to the 20th century, this language border did not merely distinguish speakers of Belgian French
, standard Dutch and standard German
, as today, but between Romance and Germanic dialect continua
. The Germanic sprachraum was made of different components such as West Flemish
, East Flemish
, Brabantic, Limburgish, Ripuarian (transitional dialects between Limbourgish and Ripuarian are called Low Dietsch
), Moselle Franconian
dialect of Trier
and Luxembourgish
. The Romance sprachraum was made of Picard
, Walloon
(with four distinct dialects around the cities of Charleroi
, Namur
, Liège
and Bastogne
), Lorrain
and Champenois
. Due to mass education
and the expansion of modern media such as television, the mid-20th century saw a uniformization of the different language regions leading to the domination of the standard languages in their respective domains. In Wallonia, French became the dominant, priority language (local dialects being seldom used). Elsewhere in the Low Countries, the local dialects survived better, at least in private use.
The historical language border in the Low Countries corresponds to the frontier between populations whose majorities spoke distinct languages. However, the ruling upper classes most often spoke French. As was the case in many European noble court
s, French was historically the nobility's language. This was also the case most of the rest of the Low Countries. Several sovereigns of the region, notably including Maria Theresa of Austria
, succeeded in making French not only the language of the court but also of their administrations. For instance, while the major part of the population of Luxembourg speaks Luxembourgish in a private context, the administrative language
of Luxembourg is French. As another example, the motto of the Kingdom of the Netherlands is the French phrase: "Je maintiendrai", owing to the fact that the language of the Orange-Nassau reigning family was French until 1890. In Flanders, until the beginning of the 20th century, many upper class Flemish burghers, such as Maurice Maeterlinck
or Suzanne Lilar
, used French as their first language. Another example is the University of Ghent which was a French-speaking institution until 1930.
The language areas were established in 1963. The division into language areas was included into the Belgian Constitution
in 1970. The border between the language areas is the so-called Belgian language or linguistic border. It is based on the actual language border between the sprachraums but is not utterly identical. Through constitutional reforms
in the 1970s and 1980s, regionalisation
of the unitary state
led to a three-tiered federation
: federal
, regional, and community governments were created, a compromise designed to minimize linguistic, cultural, social and economic tensions. The authority of the Regions and Communities is limited to some language areas:
This territorial issue, in particular around Brussels, is a source of tension between the Belgian communities.
asserted that Belgian identity was not defined on racial, ethnic or linguistic lines, but in the civilizational commune of the Belgian people. Supporters of a partition of Belgium argue that the synchronized attempts to forge a national identity and culture have been unable to forestall ethno-linguistic rivalries.
was and still is predominantly Dutch-speaking. The government's long refusal to acknowledge Dutch as an official language led to hostilities between Flanders and the French-speaking bourgeoisie
who held both political and economic power. These hostilities gave rise to the Flemish movement
, which began as a literary and cultural organization, but later became a political movement that called for legal recognition of Dutch and for social emancipation of the Flemish people
. The 1898 Equality Law
made Dutch an official language of Belgium, but it did not become the sole official language of Flanders until 1921. The Frenchification of Brussels
was at that time in full expansion. To this day, French remains the language of the aristocracy.
While a Wallon industrial and mining base
developed during the 19th century, the largely agrarian Flanders area trailed in socio-economic development, leading to widespread demands for regional autonomy and the correction of imbalances in taxation, social services, and representation. The deterioration of the Walloon industrial base in the late 20th century occurred parallel to the growth of service and technological industries in Flanders, aggravating socio-economic tensions. Modern Fleming demands center over the alleged over-taxation of Flanders and insufficient autonomy and complaints over the concentration of social services in Wallonia, causing a so-called "stream of money" from Flanders to Wallonia. The Flemish movement has inspired the growth of Flemish nationalist political parties such as the Volksunie
(People's Union) which split into different parties including the Vlaams Blok
(succeeded by the Vlaams Belang
), the New Flemish Alliance (N-VA) and FlemishProgressives. While the N-VA seeks greater autonomy and favours the independence of Flanders, possibly in a confederate state, the Vlaams Belang is more clearly separatist.
reacted in 1912 to the process of minorisation of Wallonia and asked explicitly for a partition of Belgium along linguistic lines. However, Destrée was using the word separation in French in the sense of federalization , and not in the sense of complete partition. The New York Times
explained that Destrée was afraid of the domination of the Flemings within Belgian institutions.
The Flemish historian Maarten van Ginderachter wrote that the Walloons were "excluded from the national power, between 1884 and 1902 there was only one Walloon in the Belgian government"
After the division of Belgium into two clearly separate linguistic areas, and after the economic decline of Wallonia, two more or less separate currents have formed. One is a more regional Walloon movement, demanding to maintain the solidarity between the richer north and the poorer south, but also increasingly stressing the separate cultural identity of Wallonia. Another current is merely Francophone and pro-Belgian, but not regional as such, mainly based on the French-speakers of Brussels and especially of the surrounding rim municipalities which are effectively suburbs of Brussels but situated in Flanders. The two movements have in common the support of the French language, support of the Belgian state and opposition to further federal devolution. A minority of Walloons, however, support increased independence. Flemish nationalists have claimed that the French-speaking "Belgicists" of Brussels and its suburbs do not have common interests with the Walloons, but that these two parties have formed a quid-pro-quo alliance to oppose the Dutch-speaking majority. According to this analysis, Walloon politicians would allegedly give political support to the French-speaking politicians of Brussels (and its surroundings) in return for receiving economic support to Wallonia.
Since the 1960s, Belgian political parties and civic organizations have witnessed bifurcation of membership and organizations between Walloon and Flanders. Ethnic tensions affect the working of local governments, which often pass laws prohibiting the use of the language of the respective minority populations in official functions. For example, municipal council meetings in Flanders must take place in Dutch, even if a majority of the council is French-speaking. On the other hand, Dutch-speaking citizens of the Flemish municipalities close to Brussels claim their position is being undermined by the minority rights of French-speaking settlers. Significant pressures in living conditions have kept the two main communities separate and confined to their majority regions; stark ethnic and linguistic segregation has emerged in Brussels, the capital and largest city of the country. Ethnic tensions have affected some of the city's surrounding municipalities, which are situated in Flanders, but have had a great influx of monolingual French-speakers as a result of suburbanisation. These Dutch-speaking "facility municipalities" are obliged to offer local government services in French, meaning health-care and public amenities are divided on linguistic lines, and in some municipalities the original French-speaking minority is believed to have become a majority.
The status of Brussels in a partitioned Belgium is uncertain and a source of considerable debate.
Union with Flanders
One idea is that the city rejoins Flanders in which Brussels is geographically and economically embedded. Proposals include a guarantee that the linguistic rights of the French-speaking population in Brussels are safeguarded.
Union with Wallonia
Another idea is that Brussels would form a union with Wallonia, often referred to as Wallobrux. One problem is that both regions do not border each other, as Brussels is an enclave in Flanders. Some French-speaking politicians therefore demand that a corridor is made between the two territories (see the topic of the extension of Brussels below)
City-state scenario
Another idea is that Brussels would become a "European [capital] district", similar to Washington D.C. or the Australian Capital Territory
, run by the EU rather than Flanders or Wallonia. The Union's structure has however no experience at governing at this level at present. To fulfill this solution in practice, Brussels would probably need to be an independent city-state
which could join the EU on equal footing with other EU member states. The possible status of Brussels as a "city-state" has been suggested by Charles Picqué
, Minister-President
of the Brussels-Capital Region, who sees a tax on the EU institutions
as a way of enriching the city. However, the Belgian issue has generated very little discussion within the EU bodies.
Extension of Brussels
A controversial issue, complicating the "city-state" scenario, is the possible extension of the Brussels capital region into the surrounding municipalities
within Flemish Brabant and Walloon Brabant
. This proposal is not necessarily linked to a split-up of Belgium.
Some have, however, suggested that these wealthy areas would make the city financially viable as an independent state, potentially give it around 1.5 million inhabitants, an airport
and forest
within its boundaries, and make it three or four times larger than the current capital region. Currently, Brussels is the most important seat of EU institutions, but the EU has no formal capital. It has been claimed that a large and independent status may help Brussels advance its claim as the capital of the EU.
The enlargement of the Brussels capital region is supported by many French-speakers in the Flemish municipalities with facilities for French-speakers surrounding Brussels. As a result of suburbanisation and an influx of French-speakers and EU officials from Brussels, these municipalities have in recent decades become increasingly French-speaking to an extent that French-speakers now form a majority in some municipalities. In contrast, an extension of the bilingual region is out of the question for the Dutch-speaking inhabitants of these communities and for virtually all Flemish political parties, who say that these newer inhabitants should respect and adjust to the language of the region they're moving into.
Similar to a "Greater Brussels" region, the electoral district of Brussels-Halle-Vilvoorde
consists of Brussels and 35 surrounding municipalities in Flanders. This district is the only remaining entity in Belgium that does not coincide with provincial borders, and as such it has been deemed unconstitutional by the Belgian Constitutional Court. This has been a conflict issue for years and a major political problem in the cabinet formation crisis of 2007–2008
.
Condominium
Another proposition is the establishment of a Flemish-Walloon condominium
of Brussels, where both sides govern Brussels together. This idea is in general popular among Flemish politicians, such as socialist politician Louis Tobback
and nationalist Bart De Wever
.
in the east is in fact more an observer than a player in the difficult negotiations between Flanders and Wallonia. The region of Eupen-Malmedy
was given to Belgium in the aftermath of the first World War. The city of Malmedy
and the surrounding villages are francophone. German is spoken in Eupen and around the small city of St. Vith in the Belgian Eifel
. The territory is about 850 km². Approximately 72,000 people live there. The conflict between Walloons and Flemings provided the German-speaking Community with considerable autonomy. Although the region is too small to play a role in the negotiations, it obtained an autonomy similar to that of its larger neighbors. After long lasting discrimation within French-dominated Belgium, the German-speaking Belgians now have a parliament and a government with four ministers and a minister-president
.
Four theoretical scenarios are usually considered in the event that a partition of Belgium would occur. Eupen and St. Vith are part of the province of Liège. A status quo would mean that the Community would stay unified to Wallonia. The question is open as to whether or not the German-speakers would keep their cultural and political rights in the long term. The second possibility would be a reunification with Germany. The opponents to this idea argue that the autonomy of the region would then be lost. The end of discrimination within the region has created a strong cohesion of the population and some would prefer the creation of an independent state rather than reunification with Germany. They argue that the new country would be larger and more populated than Liechtenstein
. Opponents to this scenario say this would lead to the creation of a new tax haven
that the European Union does not need. The last option would be to merge with Luxembourg
. Supporters of this scenario underline that many from St. Vith currently commute to Luxembourg and that a union with the rich Grand Duchy
would be economically profitable. Minister-President Karl-Heinz Lambertz
was once said to have supported such a project. He, however, has refuted this and has committed himself to the continued union with Belgium. In an interview with the German TV-channel ZDF in February 2011, he listed the four aforementioned options concerning the future of the German-speaking Community.
The parties with long lasting participation in the Belgian governments, that is the Christian Democrats, the Liberals and the Socialists, as well as the Green parties, usually refuse to speak openly about a possible partitioning of Belgium. This question seems to be taboo on the Belgian political scene and is only discussed from time to time by main stream politicians in order to menace the other community, not unlike the atomic bomb threat during the Cold War
context. In particular, on 6 September 2010, after long lasting negotiation for the formation of the federal government, most leaders of the French-speaking Socialist Party simultaneously declared that they now consider the partition of Belgium as a realistic alternative solution to the Belgian problems. This openly separatist point of view expressed by the French-speaking Socialists is analysed by some, including French-speaking liberals and most Flemish politicians, as an idle threat which aims at forcing progress in communatarian negotiations. The heart of the problem is not the partition of Belgium but its federalization also called regionalization or communitarization. This process of devolution
, which began in the 1960s due to the pressure of the Flemish movement
and, to a lesser extent, of the Walloon movement
, is called in the Belgian context the state reform
. While most Francophones argue that the state reform is unnecessary, virtually all Flemish political parties demand a severe reform of the Belgian state. In particular the N-VA and a part of the Flemish movement want to apply the so-called Maddens Doctrine
in order to enforce the Francophones to require such a state reform.
Socialist Party Different (sp.a), the Flemish socialist party, states on its website that it believes an independent Flanders is not necessary. It does support the devolution of a number of additional responsibilities, such as the railways or the policy of employment. [Open Vlaamse Liberalen en Democraten|Open Flemish Liberals and Democrats]] (Open VLD) want more socio-economic and financial autonomy for Flanders, a homogenous division of responsibilities, more cooperation between the communities and regions and a strong federal state. Green!, the Flemish green party, wants another round in the state reform, but only if it leads to more solidarity, a better functioning of the institutions and more democracy. It states on its website that it doesn’t want to reform for the purpose of reforming. Green! wants Belgium to remain a federal state and considers the cooperation between different communities within one state to be a challenge rather than a problem. It also pleads for federal loyalty and respect for the rulings of the Constitutional Court and wants to see a more homogenous division of responsibilities.
The Francophone Socialist Party (PS) and Christian democrats (cdH) promote the conservation of the current Belgian welfare state
, and therefore oppose any further regionalisation of the federal social policies
. The Reformist Movement, the Francophone liberal party, stresses in its manifesto that the Flemings are intending to split most of the solidarity mechanisms that exist between the Belgians. They also state that they minimize the importance of the Brussels-Capital Region as a constitutional component of the federal state. Their approach is to build strong links between the different components of the French-speaking part of Belgium, including Brussels and Wallonnia as well as the municipalities with a French-speaking presence around Brussels and in Voeren. The aim of this approach is to create a strong autonomous Francophone component within the federal state. Écolo, the Francophone Green party, supports an improvement of the political links between the communities. They suggest, among other things, the creation of a national electoral arrondissement
for the election of part of the federal parliament.
. Other openly separatist but more mainstream parties emerged recently: New Flemish Alliance, List Dedecker. In Wallonia and Brussels, only the Wallonia-France Rally party is openly separatist. This party, which has no elected representative at either the national or regional level, promotes the partition of Belgium and a union of Wallonia and Brussels with France
.
Several small parties with no or very few seats at the parliament campaign explicitly for the unity of the Belgian state. The conservative Belgian Union promotes a stronger federal government and a return to the Belgian unitary state which existed in the 1960s. The far-left Workers' Party of Belgium also supports the unity of Belgium since it considers the federalisation of the country as an employers' attack at the welfare state and the unity of the trade union
s. The Francophone far-right Front National is also explicitly opposed to the partition of Belgium.
There are several Walloon representatives of the Socialist Party in the Walloon Parliament who are in favour of the Walloon Regionalism, also in the Walloon Government such as Eliane Tillieux and Jean-Claude Marcourt
for instance, i.e. two socialist ministers on the four of the Walloon Government. The Walloon wing of the General Federation of Belgian Labour
are in favour of more powers for the Regions.
, resulted in no political party or coalition gaining enough seats to form a working majority. The crisis continued for 196 days, leaving Belgium without a government with a popular mandate. While prime minister Guy Verhofstadt
's lame duck
ministry remained in power as caretaker
, several leading politicians were nominated without success by the King to build a stable governmental coalition. Flemish politician Yves Leterme
had been the prime candidate to lead the national government, but a political gaffe would prove to be his undoing. Asked to sing the Belgian national anthem in French at National Day celebrations, instead of the Brabançonne Leterme started to sing the Marseillaise
, France's anthem. Leterme's error drew condemnation from the different communities, aggravating distrust and separatist sentiments.
Eventually, after 196 days, the parties finally succeeded in forming a new government. In December 2008, another crisis related to the Fortis case
, erupted, again destabilising the country and resulting in the resignation of Belgian Prime Minister Yves Leterme
. The new Herman Van Rompuy
-led government brought a brief period of fragile stability, but ended when Van Rompuy left his office to become the first full-term President of the European Council
. The succeeding Leterme II government
fell in April 2010 over the lack of progress on resolving the BHV issue.
Although most Flemish political parties describe their demands as limited to seeking greater regional autonomy and decentralization of government (save for members of the Vlaams Belang
party, who called for a splitting of the country and claim of a national identity, culture
and institutions, and claim Belgium is an "unnatural" and "artificial" state, formed simply as a buffer between France and other European powers during 19th century conflicts), some public opinion polls performed during the communautary crisis showed that approximately 46% of Flemish people support secession from Belgium. Other surveys indicated only 12% of the Flemings want the end of Belgium, whereas 37% want more responsibilities to be devolved to communities and the regions. Many French-speakers maintain that there is sufficient regional autonomy and that Flemish demands are exaggerated and separatist in nature. However, the diversity of Brussels and its significant economic and geopolitical importance in the Western hemisphere as the headquarters of the European Union
and NATO, make it a unifying force, making partition unlikely at least for the near future. In response to heightening domestic and international speculation regarding the country's future, the Belgian government launched a public relations campaign through its embassies worldwide to assuage concerns and fight speculation that Belgium's division is impending, as indicated by numerous recent public opinion polls. The King of the Belgians rejected notions and speculation over a change in the nature of the Belgian state as part of proposals for the formation of a working government.
On November 18, 2007, an estimated 25,000 people marched in Brussels to support the unity of Belgium. The march was organized by Marie-Claire Houart
whose petition calling for unity was signed by 140,000 Belgians.
The Belgian Chamber of Representatives on November 22, 2007, rejected the consideration of a proposed resolution to dissolve Belgium. The resolution had been introduced on October 29 by Bart Laeremans
, Gerolf Annemans
, Filip De Man
and Linda Vissers
(Vlaams Belang
) and called upon the federal government
to "take without delay the measures necessary for the purpose of preparing the break-up of the Belgian State, so the three communities — Flemings, Walloons and Germans — can go their own separate ways." Most Flemish parties voted against the consideration of the proposal. The three members of the New Flemish Alliance abstained, together with three members of CD&V
.
In 2007, Polls in Editie NL, a Dutch news program on the commercial station RTL 4
and newspaper De Dag (The Day) in the Netherlands showed that between 45% and 77% of Dutch nationals (the results of the two different polls) would support a merger of their country with Flanders. However a similar poll performed by Synovate Nederland in 2010, showed that only 20% of the Dutch support a union between the Netherlands and Flanders. A comparable poll held in 2007 in France showed that a majority of French citizens would support a merger of Wallonia with France, if Belgium ceased to exist. However, French politicians have ruled out any interference into the inner Belgian debate.
After the Open Flemish Liberals and Democrats (Open VLD) left the government on April 22, 2010, Prime Minister Yves Leterme
offered his resignation to King Albert II
. An election
were then called for June 13, amid fears that coalition-building would once again be protracted. In Flanders, the New Flemish Alliance (N-VA) party won a plurality with 27.8% of votes, while the winning party in Wallonia was the Socialist Party. Both parties, along with other parties, negotiated a state reform during the 2010 Belgian government formation
.
Although seven parties (N-VA, CD&V, sp.a, Groen!, PS, cdH, and Ecolo) were participating, the negotiations were led by the main winners, Bart De Wever
(N-VA) and Elio Di Rupo
(PS). The large number of implied parties was due not only to the multipolar Belgian political landscape but also to the will of the Flemish parties to reform the state
and, hence, to change the constitution
, which can be modified according only to very restrictive rules including a two-third majority vote in the Lower House.
Some in the international media saw this election as evidence that Belgium would be partitioned. On September 9, 2010, a poll taken by RTL
showed that a third of the French-speaking population supported the beginning of preparations for the country's partition. On September 13, Het Laatste Nieuws
published the result of a poll within the Flemish population. According to these results 60% of the Flemish did not desire an independent Flemish state and 26% were willing to support a partition. A similar poll taken on September 25, 2010 by La Libre Belgique
showed that 40% of the Belgians were willing to return to a unitary Belgium (as the country was before the state reform
of the 1970s). This percentage is to be compared with the 12% of the Belgians wanting a partition of the country and the 32% who desired a further federalization. The poll also showed that a unitary Belgian state was supported by 22% of the Flemish, 50% of the Brusselers and 51% of the Walloons, and that 16% of the Flemish wished a split of Belgium. It is interesting to compare this with the 40.8% of Flemings who voted for a party advocating Flemish independence during the 2010 election. In any case, the vast majority of the Belgians want a change: only 8% agree with the current Belgian federal system. The Belgians who participated in this poll were also asked which scenario they would prefer in case a partition of Belgium did occur. An independent Flanders together with a union of Brussels and Wallonia was supported by 35% of the Belgians. The creation of three small states (Flanders, Brussels and Wallonia) was preferred by 23%, a union between France and Wallonia was supported by 14%, and a union between Flanders and Brussels together with an independent Wallonia by 12%. In Flanders, 27% supported a three-state scenario and 26% supported a union between Flanders and Brussels. Those who had no preferred scenario numbered 25%. The majority of the Walloons (53%) agreed with a union between Brussels and Wallonia while a minority (21%) supported a merge with France. Only 10% of the Walloons prefer an independent Walloon state. In contrast, the Brusselers were divided between a union with Wallonia (39%) and a city-state scenario (34%).
On October 4, 2010, Bart De Wever
(N-VA) departed from the negotiations. His exit put Elio Di Rupo
's Plan B for Belgium, i.e. a partition of Belgium along the borderline of the French Community, under a new light and many, particularly in the French-speaking part of the country, started to speak openly about its concrete realization. Plan B is the continuation of Belgium with Brussels and Wallonia only and the departure of Flanders from the Belgian federation. On October 10, Elio Di Rupo stated on television what his plan was: first, asking the Flemish population whether it was willing to secede; second, asking the population in Brussels and Wallonia whether they intended to remain united within Belgium. He also stressed that in either case citizens living in municipalities with linguistic facilities should also be asked. He however underlined that he did not desire such an extreme response but that this scenario should not be ignored. Di Rupo's declarations on television have been broadly discussed in the French-written press: according to Le Soir, the country had never been so close to a split than this day; less alarmist La Libre Belgique
observed that the negotiations are deadlocked and considered Di Rupo's move a good way to define the point that the Francophones are not ready to negotiate further. However La Dernière Heure
, Vers l'Avenir and Flemish columnists in De Morgen
, Het Laatste Nieuws
and De Standaard
condensed Di Rupo's Plan B down to a tactical move in order to put the pressure on the negotiations and redefine the relations between PS and MR. The Plan B proposed by Di Rupo was developed by Christian Berhendt, a specialist of constitutional law at the University of Liège
. According to Berhendt, a hypothetical partition of Belgium is constrained by the fact that no political party is ready to split Belgium at the cost of separating from the numerous international organizations to which Belgium is affiliated. These constraints are such that a splitting of the country would require the modification and ratification of a huge number of treaties. The interpenetration of the Belgian entities is so complicated that, in comparison, the peaceful split of Czechoslovakia
appears quite simple. According to Berhendt several scenarios are therefore impossible: a unilateral secession of Flanders would be rejected by countries fearing secession of their own minorities, such as China, Russia or Spain, because this would create a precedent they cannot allow; the creation of an autonomous European district in Brussels is not a realistic perspective because the European Union, as it is now, is not able to administrate such a large city; a scenario where Flanders and Brussels would form a union is not possible either because, according to Berhendt, the French-speakers will never agree on such a treaty. For Marc Verdussen (Université Catholique de Louvain
), two doorways are open: Plan B1, Belgium dissolves into two entities Flanders on the one hand and a new Wallonia-Brussels state on the other; and Plan B2, Flanders secedes and a residual Belgian state continues with Brussels and Wallonia. Though it is clear that Plan B2 is favorable to the Francophones, it is not evident that it would be accepted by the Flemings and by a hypothetical international tribunal. According to the Gewif (Groupe d'études pour la Wallonie intégrée à la France), Di Rupo's Plan B is not realisable because the new Brussels-Wallonia would inherit an unbearable debt. The Gewif therefore argued that only a union with France would be possible. On September 13 Le Soir
published a five-pages article on the possible consequences. According to this analysis, the largest burden on the shoulders of the new Brussels-Wallonian state would be unemployment (17% of the workers; to be compared to 8% in Flanders) and state debt (150 Billions Euros, i.e. 106% of GDP). However Le Soir's columnists observed that the new state would have a huge GDP per capita (31,000 €) and would rank 7th among the 27 EU states. Nevertheless this would be only due to the inclusion of Brussels where the GDP per capita numbers more than 60,000 €.
Belgium
Belgium , officially the Kingdom of Belgium, is a federal state in Western Europe. It is a founding member of the European Union and hosts the EU's headquarters, and those of several other major international organisations such as NATO.Belgium is also a member of, or affiliated to, many...
through the separation of the Dutch-speaking
Dutch language
Dutch is a West Germanic language and the native language of the majority of the population of the Netherlands, Belgium, and Suriname, the three member states of the Dutch Language Union. Most speakers live in the European Union, where it is a first language for about 23 million and a second...
people of the Flanders region
Flanders
Flanders is the community of the Flemings but also one of the institutions in Belgium, and a geographical region located in parts of present-day Belgium, France and the Netherlands. "Flanders" can also refer to the northern part of Belgium that contains Brussels, Bruges, Ghent and Antwerp...
and Brussels
Brussels
Brussels , officially the Brussels Region or Brussels-Capital Region , is the capital of Belgium and the de facto capital of the European Union...
from the French-speaking
French language
French is a Romance language spoken as a first language in France, the Romandy region in Switzerland, Wallonia and Brussels in Belgium, Monaco, the regions of Quebec and Acadia in Canada, and by various communities elsewhere. Second-language speakers of French are distributed throughout many parts...
people of the Walloon region and Brussels
Brussels
Brussels , officially the Brussels Region or Brussels-Capital Region , is the capital of Belgium and the de facto capital of the European Union...
, granting them either independence or respective accession to the Netherlands
Netherlands
The Netherlands is a constituent country of the Kingdom of the Netherlands, located mainly in North-West Europe and with several islands in the Caribbean. Mainland Netherlands borders the North Sea to the north and west, Belgium to the south, and Germany to the east, and shares maritime borders...
and France
France
The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...
, is currently being discussed in the Belgian and international media. The concept is rooted in the long-standing ethnic, linguistic and socio-economic tensions between the two communities as well as the geographic and cultural continuity of Wallonia with France and that of Flanders with the Netherlands.
Background
The territories corresponding to the modern Belgian, Dutch and LuxembourgLuxembourg
Luxembourg , officially the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg , is a landlocked country in western Europe, bordered by Belgium, France, and Germany. It has two principal regions: the Oesling in the North as part of the Ardennes massif, and the Gutland in the south...
ish states are collectively called the Low Countries
Low Countries
The Low Countries are the historical lands around the low-lying delta of the Rhine, Scheldt, and Meuse rivers, including the modern countries of Belgium, the Netherlands, Luxembourg and parts of northern France and western Germany....
. They emerged at the end of the Middle Ages
Middle Ages
The Middle Ages is a periodization of European history from the 5th century to the 15th century. The Middle Ages follows the fall of the Western Roman Empire in 476 and precedes the Early Modern Era. It is the middle period of a three-period division of Western history: Classic, Medieval and Modern...
as a set of more or less independent fiefdom
Fiefdom
A fee was the central element of feudalism and consisted of heritable lands granted under one of several varieties of feudal tenure by an overlord to a vassal who held it in fealty in return for a form of feudal allegiance and service, usually given by the...
s loosely linked to the Kingdom of France
France in the Middle Ages
France in the Middle Ages covers an area roughly corresponding to modern day France, from the death of Louis the Pious in 840 to the middle of the 15th century...
and the Holy Roman Empire
Holy Roman Empire
The Holy Roman Empire was a realm that existed from 962 to 1806 in Central Europe.It was ruled by the Holy Roman Emperor. Its character changed during the Middle Ages and the Early Modern period, when the power of the emperor gradually weakened in favour of the princes...
. The southern part of this region — the Southern Netherlands
Southern Netherlands
Southern Netherlands were a part of the Low Countries controlled by Spain , Austria and annexed by France...
, the Prince-Bishopric of Liège, the Imperial Abbey of Stavelot-Malmedy and the Duchy of Bouillon — was partitioned both politically (into many fiefdoms), and linguistically (into the Romanic
Romance languages
The Romance languages are a branch of the Indo-European language family, more precisely of the Italic languages subfamily, comprising all the languages that descend from Vulgar Latin, the language of ancient Rome...
and Germanic
Germanic languages
The Germanic languages constitute a sub-branch of the Indo-European language family. The common ancestor of all of the languages in this branch is called Proto-Germanic , which was spoken in approximately the mid-1st millennium BC in Iron Age northern Europe...
Sprachräume
Sprachraum
Sprachraum is a linguistic term used to designate a geographical region/district where a language, dialect, group or family of languages is spoken. The German word Sprachraum literally means "language area"....
). The feudal borders did not match the linguistic borders, and some fiefdoms were divided into Francophone and Germanic regions. However, the ruling aristocracy, which usually spoke languages other than the population, did not much bother about these language-related disparities. After the 1581 secession of the Dutch Republic
Dutch Republic
The Dutch Republic — officially known as the Republic of the Seven United Netherlands , the Republic of the United Netherlands, or the Republic of the Seven United Provinces — was a republic in Europe existing from 1581 to 1795, preceding the Batavian Republic and ultimately...
in the northern Low Countries, French progressively emerged in the Southern Netherlands
Southern Netherlands
Southern Netherlands were a part of the Low Countries controlled by Spain , Austria and annexed by France...
under the influence of the Habsburg
Habsburg
The House of Habsburg , also found as Hapsburg, and also known as House of Austria is one of the most important royal houses of Europe and is best known for being an origin of all of the formally elected Holy Roman Emperors between 1438 and 1740, as well as rulers of the Austrian Empire and...
nobility and, later, of the French invasions, as the upper class
Upper class
In social science, the "upper class" is the group of people at the top of a social hierarchy. Members of an upper class may have great power over the allocation of resources and governmental policy in their area.- Historical meaning :...
language, not only at the court but also in the administration and in the political circles.
Antagonism between speakers of French and Dutch increased after the independence of Belgium
Belgian Revolution
The Belgian Revolution was the conflict which led to the secession of the Southern provinces from the United Kingdom of the Netherlands and established an independent Kingdom of Belgium....
in 1830, when residents of the Southern Netherlands and their exclusively French-speaking political elite rebelled against the newfound hegemony of the northern provinces of the United Kingdom of the Netherlands
United Kingdom of the Netherlands
United Kingdom of the Netherlands is the unofficial name used to refer to Kingdom of the Netherlands during the period after it was first created from part of the First French Empire and before the new kingdom of Belgium split out in 1830...
. Major European powers were divided in opinion over the fallout of the revolution. Ultimately, the state of Belgium, composed of provinces of both French-speaking and Dutch-speaking people, gained independence as a buffer state
Buffer state
A buffer state is a country lying between two rival or potentially hostile greater powers, which by its sheer existence is thought to prevent conflict between them. Buffer states, when authentically independent, typically pursue a neutralist foreign policy, which distinguishes them from satellite...
between France and the Netherlands. French became the sole official language
Language legislation in Belgium
-1830: freedom of languages and linguistic coercion:One of the causes of the Belgian Revolution of the 1830s was the growing ascendancy of the Dutch language in the administration of the Southern provinces of the United Kingdom of the Netherlands...
. Dutch speakers demanded equal rights beginning in the late 19th century, but these were only introduced gradually throughout the 20th century. While postage stamps became bilingual in 1893, it was not until 1967 that an official Dutch version of the Constitution
Constitution of Belgium
The Constitution of Belgium dates back to 1831. Since then Belgium has been a parliamentary monarchy that applies the principles of ministerial responsibility for the government policy and the Trias Politica. The Constitution established Belgium as a centralised unitary state...
was accepted. Since independence, socio-economic imbalances
Economy of Belgium
The modern, private enterprise economy of Belgium has capitalised on its central geographic location, highly developed transport network, and diversified industrial and commercial base...
have fueled resentment between the two communities.
Since the 1960s, separate regions have been created based on the country's linguistic division. As a result, minorities in certain areas (in and around Brussels and along the language border) claim to be disenfranchised in local government and services. Along with the usual left–right political division, there is also a linguistic division, causing a double party system which complicates coalition creation on the national level. The recent crisis over the formation of a coalition government
2007–2008 Belgian government formation
The 2007–2008 Belgian government formation followed the general election of 10 June 2007, and consisted of a period of negotiation in which the Flemish parties Flemish Liberal Democratic , Christian Democratic and Flemish and New Flemish Alliance , and the French-speaking parties Reformist...
in the aftermath of the 2007 elections
Belgian general election, 2007
The 2007 Belgian general election took place on Sunday 10 June 2007. Voters went to the polls in order to elect new members for the Chamber of Representatives and Senate.Eligible voters were Belgian citizens 18 years and older...
, coupled with the unsolved problem of the Brussels-Halle-Vilvoorde
Brussels-Halle-Vilvoorde
Brussels-Halle-Vilvoorde is a Belgian electoral and judicial arrondissement in the center of the country, encompassing:* the officially bilingual Brussels-Capital Region, which coincides...
electoral district and the rise of extremist political parties, has given a fresh impetus to the issue, with recent opinion polls showing sizable support for a partition. However, support for a unified state remains among the majority of Belgium's people. Unitarists claim that the monarchy, strong national institutions, and the geopolitical importance of the linguistically and ethnically mixed Brussels
Brussels
Brussels , officially the Brussels Region or Brussels-Capital Region , is the capital of Belgium and the de facto capital of the European Union...
serve as unifying elements, while separatists rather claim these factors (and the considerable state debt
Economy of Belgium
The modern, private enterprise economy of Belgium has capitalised on its central geographic location, highly developed transport network, and diversified industrial and commercial base...
) serve merely as obstacles to an inevitable partition. Some political observers have suggested that a possible partition of Belgium may be a blow to the European Union
European Union
The European Union is an economic and political union of 27 independent member states which are located primarily in Europe. The EU traces its origins from the European Coal and Steel Community and the European Economic Community , formed by six countries in 1958...
model of diverse cultures working together.
Regional demographics
 |
 |
As no census
Census
A census is the procedure of systematically acquiring and recording information about the members of a given population. It is a regularly occurring and official count of a particular population. The term is used mostly in connection with national population and housing censuses; other common...
exists, there are no official statistics on Belgium's three official languages or their dialects. Various criteria, including the language(s) of parents, of education, or the second-language status of foreign born, may affect suggested figures. An estimated 59% of the Belgian population speaks Dutch
Dutch language
Dutch is a West Germanic language and the native language of the majority of the population of the Netherlands, Belgium, and Suriname, the three member states of the Dutch Language Union. Most speakers live in the European Union, where it is a first language for about 23 million and a second...
(often colloquially referred to as Flemish
Flemish
Flemish can refer to anything related to Flanders, and may refer directly to the following articles:*Flemish, an informal, though linguistically incorrect, name of any kind of the Dutch language as spoken in Belgium....
), and French
French language
French is a Romance language spoken as a first language in France, the Romandy region in Switzerland, Wallonia and Brussels in Belgium, Monaco, the regions of Quebec and Acadia in Canada, and by various communities elsewhere. Second-language speakers of French are distributed throughout many parts...
is spoken by 40%. Total Dutch speakers number 6.23 million, concentrated in the northern Flanders
Flemish Region
The Flemish Region is one of the three official regions of the Kingdom of Belgium—alongside the Walloon Region and the Brussels-Capital Region. Colloquially, it is usually simply referred to as Flanders, of which it is the institutional iteration within the context of the Belgian political system...
region, while French speakers comprise 3.32 million in Wallonia and an estimated 870,000 or 85%, of the officially bilingual Brussels-Capital Region. The German-speaking Community
German-speaking Community of Belgium
The German-speaking Community of Belgium is one of the three federal communities of Belgium. Covering an area of 854 km² within the province of Liège in Wallonia, it includes nine of the eleven municipalities of the so-called East Cantons...
is made up of 73,000 people in the east of Wallonia; around 10,000 German and 60,000 Belgian nationals are speakers of German
German language
German is a West Germanic language, related to and classified alongside English and Dutch. With an estimated 90 – 98 million native speakers, German is one of the world's major languages and is the most widely-spoken first language in the European Union....
. Roughly 23,000 more of German speakers live in municipalities near the official Community.
French Community of Belgium
The French Community of Belgium is one of the three official communities in Belgium along with the Flemish Community and the German speaking Community. Although its name could suggest that it is a community of French citizens in Belgium, it is not...
or the Flemish one. Geographically, it is an enclave in the Flemish Region though near Wallonia. Constitutionally, it is a politically-distinct Region, while within its boundaries both the Flemish and French Communities exercise their authority. Historically, the local language of Brussels was Dutch
Frenchification of Brussels
The Frenchification of Brussels is the transformation of Brussels, Belgium, from a Dutch-speaking city to one that is bilingual or even multilingual, with French as both the majority language and lingua franca...
, and Dutch remained the vernacular language of a majority of inhabitants until around 1950. Now Dutch is mainly spoken by approximately 150,000 residents, or a 15% minority at most. The city has strong economic ties with surrounding Flanders, and many Dutch-speakers commute to Brussels for work, but at the same time the expanding suburbs of Brussels led to a majority of French-speakers in six Flemish villages.
Feudal borders
Low Countries
The Low Countries are the historical lands around the low-lying delta of the Rhine, Scheldt, and Meuse rivers, including the modern countries of Belgium, the Netherlands, Luxembourg and parts of northern France and western Germany....
. The Low Countries emerged at the end of the Middle Ages as a very loose political confederation
Confederation
A confederation in modern political terms is a permanent union of political units for common action in relation to other units. Usually created by treaty but often later adopting a common constitution, confederations tend to be established for dealing with critical issues such as defense, foreign...
of fiefdom
Fiefdom
A fee was the central element of feudalism and consisted of heritable lands granted under one of several varieties of feudal tenure by an overlord to a vassal who held it in fealty in return for a form of feudal allegiance and service, usually given by the...
s ruled in personal union
Personal union
A personal union is the combination by which two or more different states have the same monarch while their boundaries, their laws and their interests remain distinct. It should not be confused with a federation which is internationally considered a single state...
by the House of Habsburg: the Seventeen Provinces
Seventeen Provinces
The Seventeen Provinces were a personal union of states in the Low Countries in the 15th century and 16th century, roughly covering the current Netherlands, Belgium, Luxembourg, a good part of the North of France , and a small part of Western Germany.The Seventeen Provinces were originally held by...
. The largest components of this union were the Duchy of Brabant
Duchy of Brabant
The Duchy of Brabant was a historical region in the Low Countries. Its territory consisted essentially of the three modern-day Belgian provinces of Flemish Brabant, Walloon Brabant and Antwerp, the Brussels-Capital Region and most of the present-day Dutch province of North Brabant.The Flag of...
, the County of Flanders
County of Flanders
The County of Flanders was one of the territories constituting the Low Countries. The county existed from 862 to 1795. It was one of the original secular fiefs of France and for centuries was one of the most affluent regions in Europe....
, the County of Hainaut
County of Hainaut
The County of Hainaut was a historical region in the Low Countries with its capital at Mons . In English sources it is often given the archaic spelling Hainault....
and the Duchy of Luxembourg
County, Duchy and Grand Duchy of Luxembourg
The County, later Duchy of Luxembourg was a state of the Holy Roman Empire, the ancestral homeland of the noble House of Luxembourg.-History:...
. The Prince-Bishopric of Liège was almost an enclave within the Seventeen Provinces. The prince-bishopric was not formally included in the Habsburgs' dominion but was, since Emperor Charles V
Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor
Charles V was ruler of the Holy Roman Empire from 1519 and, as Charles I, of the Spanish Empire from 1516 until his voluntary retirement and abdication in favor of his younger brother Ferdinand I and his son Philip II in 1556.As...
, strongly influenced by its Habsburg neighbors. The border which emerged after the Dutch Revolt
Dutch Revolt
The Dutch Revolt or the Revolt of the Netherlands This article adopts 1568 as the starting date of the war, as this was the year of the first battles between armies. However, since there is a long period of Protestant vs...
and the Eighty Years' War split the Seventeen Provinces into the Dutch Republic
Dutch Republic
The Dutch Republic — officially known as the Republic of the Seven United Netherlands , the Republic of the United Netherlands, or the Republic of the Seven United Provinces — was a republic in Europe existing from 1581 to 1795, preceding the Batavian Republic and ultimately...
and the Spanish Netherlands. In particular Brabant and Flanders were divided into northern and southern components. Though the different fiefdoms building the Southern Netherlands were more or less ruled by one reigning House only, all of them were quite distinct of each other. Different traditions and dialects of Dutch
Flemish
Flemish can refer to anything related to Flanders, and may refer directly to the following articles:*Flemish, an informal, though linguistically incorrect, name of any kind of the Dutch language as spoken in Belgium....
and Walloon
Walloon language
Walloon is a Romance language which was spoken as a primary language in large portions of the Walloon Region of Belgium and some villages of Northern France until the middle of the 20th century. It belongs to the langue d'oïl language family, whose most prominent member is the French language...
appeared. Within the largest fiefdoms like Liège, Flanders and Luxembourg, several distinct languages and dialects were in use.
Forêts
Forêts was a département of the French First Republic, and later the First French Empire, in present Belgium, Luxembourg and Germany. Its name, meaning 'forests', comes from the Ardennes forests. It was formed on 24 October 1795, after the Southern Netherlands had been annexed by France on 1...
departments. The departments would eventually become the provinces of the United Kingdom of the Netherlands
United Kingdom of the Netherlands
United Kingdom of the Netherlands is the unofficial name used to refer to Kingdom of the Netherlands during the period after it was first created from part of the First French Empire and before the new kingdom of Belgium split out in 1830...
and later on of Belgium
Belgium
Belgium , officially the Kingdom of Belgium, is a federal state in Western Europe. It is a founding member of the European Union and hosts the EU's headquarters, and those of several other major international organisations such as NATO.Belgium is also a member of, or affiliated to, many...
. The name of the provinces
Provinces of Belgium
Belgium is divided into three regions, two of them are subdivided into five provinces each.The division into provinces is fixed by Article 5 of the Belgian Constitution...
were inspired by the roughly corresponding medieval fiefdoms. In particular, the Dyle department became the province of Brabant
Province of Brabant
Brabant was a province of the United Kingdom of the Netherlands from 1815 until 1830 and a province of Belgium from 1830 until 1995, when it was split into the Dutch-speaking Flemish Brabant, the French-speaking Walloon Brabant and the bilingual Brussels-Capital Region.-United Kingdom of the...
, that is the most southern part of the older duchy of Brabant.
In 1815, the territory now constituting Belgium was incorporated into the United Kingdom of the Netherlands
United Kingdom of the Netherlands
United Kingdom of the Netherlands is the unofficial name used to refer to Kingdom of the Netherlands during the period after it was first created from part of the First French Empire and before the new kingdom of Belgium split out in 1830...
, which had been created to rehabilitate and consolidate the former Seventeen Provinces and serve as a buffer
Buffer state
A buffer state is a country lying between two rival or potentially hostile greater powers, which by its sheer existence is thought to prevent conflict between them. Buffer states, when authentically independent, typically pursue a neutralist foreign policy, which distinguishes them from satellite...
against any expansionist ambitions of France. However, this placed the Catholic Belgian provinces, including French-speaking Wallonia, under Dutch-majority rule and a Calvinist
Calvinism
Calvinism is a Protestant theological system and an approach to the Christian life...
Dutch king. The Belgians had little influence over their lives and resented Dutch control and domination over economic, political and social institutions, sentiment that culminated in revolution in 1830.
Prussia
Prussia was a German kingdom and historic state originating out of the Duchy of Prussia and the Margraviate of Brandenburg. For centuries, the House of Hohenzollern ruled Prussia, successfully expanding its size by way of an unusually well-organized and effective army. Prussia shaped the history...
and the United Kingdom
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
) were divided over their response to the revolution of the Belgian people against the Dutch royal authorities. France favored the secession of Belgium from the Netherlands, hoping to annex all or at least part of the area, which was also the aim of most of the Belgian insurgents. After this proposal had been rejected by the other European powers, which supported the continued union of the Netherlands, Talleyrand, the French ambassador to the United Kingdom, proposed a partition of the Southern Netherlands
Talleyrand partition plan for Belgium
The Talleyrand partition plan for Belgium was a proposal developed in 1830 by the then-French ambassador to the United Kingdom, Charles Maurice de Talleyrand, to partition Belgium on ethnic and regional lines...
(most areas of modern Belgium). To this end, the parts of the provinces of Liège
Liège (province)
Liège is the easternmost province of Belgium and belongs to the Walloon Region. It is an area of French and German ethnicity. It borders on the Netherlands, Germany, Luxembourg, and in Belgium the provinces of Luxembourg, Namur, Walloon Brabant , and those of Flemish Brabant and Limburg . Its...
, of Limburg and of Namur
Namur (province)
Namur is a province of Wallonia, one of the three regions of Belgium. It borders on the Walloon provinces of Hainaut, Walloon Brabant, Liège and Luxembourg in Belgium, and on France. Its capital is the city of Namur...
east of the Meuse river as well as the cities of Maastricht and Liège and the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg would go to Prussia
Prussia
Prussia was a German kingdom and historic state originating out of the Duchy of Prussia and the Margraviate of Brandenburg. For centuries, the House of Hohenzollern ruled Prussia, successfully expanding its size by way of an unusually well-organized and effective army. Prussia shaped the history...
. Part of the province of East Flanders
East Flanders
East Flanders is a province of Flanders, one of the three regions of Belgium. It borders on the Netherlands and in Belgium on the provinces of Antwerp, Flemish Brabant , of Hainaut and of West Flanders...
, nearly all of the province of Brabant, the province of Hainaut and the province of Namur west of the Meuse would be assigned to France. The province of Antwerp
Antwerp (province)
Antwerp is the northernmost province both of the Flemish Region, also called Flanders, and of Belgium. It borders on the Netherlands and the Belgian provinces of Limburg, Flemish Brabant and East Flanders. Its capital is Antwerp which comprises the Port of Antwerp...
— except the city of Antwerp itself — and the province of Limburg, west of the Meuse
Meuse
Meuse is a department in northeast France, named after the River Meuse.-History:Meuse is one of the original 83 departments created during the French Revolution on March 4, 1790...
river — except Maastricht
Maastricht
Maastricht is situated on both sides of the Meuse river in the south-eastern part of the Netherlands, on the Belgian border and near the German border...
— would remain with the Netherlands, as would a small part of the province of Brabant, the former Oranje Lordship of Diest
Diest
Diest is a city and municipality located in the Belgian province of Flemish Brabant. Situated in the northeast of the Hageland region, Diest neighbours the provinces of Antwerp to its North, and Limburg to the East and is situated around 60km from Brussels. The municipality comprises the city of...
. West Flanders, most of East Flanders, including Zeeuws-Vlaanderen
Zeeuws-Vlaanderen
Zeelandic Flanders is the southernmost region of the province of Zeeland in south-western Netherlands. It lies south of the Western Scheldt that separates the region from the remainder of Zeeland to the north...
, and the city of Antwerp were to form the Free State of Antwerp, under British protection.
However, this plan was rejected and Belgium was established as an essential buffer state to check the ambitions of France. Wallonia and Flanders were unified as one state under a German prince, Leopold I
Leopold I of Belgium
Leopold I was from 21 July 1831 the first King of the Belgians, following Belgium's independence from the Netherlands. He was the founder of the Belgian line of the House of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha...
of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha. A historian of the Belgian revolution said that "in Belgium, there are parties and provinces, but no nation. Like a tent erected for one night, the new monarchy, after sheltering us from the tempest, will disappear without a trace."
Language border
Language border
A language border or language boundary is the line separating two language areas. The term is generally meant to imply a lack of mutual intelligibility between the two languages...
separating the Germanic and Romance sprachraum
Sprachraum
Sprachraum is a linguistic term used to designate a geographical region/district where a language, dialect, group or family of languages is spoken. The German word Sprachraum literally means "language area"....
s moved over the centuries which preceded the establishment of the Belgian state over an area between the Ardennes
Ardennes
The Ardennes is a region of extensive forests, rolling hills and ridges formed within the Givetian Ardennes mountain range, primarily in Belgium and Luxembourg, but stretching into France , and geologically into the Eifel...
and the more or less straight line going from Aachen
Aachen
Aachen has historically been a spa town in North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. Aachen was a favoured residence of Charlemagne, and the place of coronation of the Kings of Germany. Geographically, Aachen is the westernmost town of Germany, located along its borders with Belgium and the Netherlands, ...
to Calais
Calais
Calais is a town in Northern France in the department of Pas-de-Calais, of which it is a sub-prefecture. Although Calais is by far the largest city in Pas-de-Calais, the department's capital is its third-largest city of Arras....
on the one hand and the much less populated frontier from Aachen
Aachen
Aachen has historically been a spa town in North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. Aachen was a favoured residence of Charlemagne, and the place of coronation of the Kings of Germany. Geographically, Aachen is the westernmost town of Germany, located along its borders with Belgium and the Netherlands, ...
to Arlon via Malmedy
Malmedy
Malmedy is a municipality of Belgium. It lies in the country's Walloon Region, Province of Liège. It belongs to the French Community of Belgium, within which it is French-speaking with facilities for German-speakers. On January 1, 2006 Malmedy had a total population of 11,829...
. However this frontier has not much changed since the 18th century. For example, in the communes of Mouscron
Mouscron
Mouscron is a Walloon city and municipality located in the Belgian province of Hainaut. The Mouscron municipality includes the old communes of Dottignies , Luingne, and Herseaux .-Middle Ages:...
-Comines-Warneton
Comines-Warneton
Comines-Warneton is a Walloon municipality located in the Belgian province of Hainaut. On January 1, 2006, Comines-Warneton had a total population of 17,562. The total area is 61.09 km² which gives a population density of 287 inhabitants per km². The name "Comines" is believed to have a...
, French seems to be dominant at least since 1761. The frontier splitting the older province of Brabant and the Hesbaye
Hesbaye
Hesbaye or Haspengouw , is a region spanning the south of the Belgian province of Limburg, the east of the Belgian provinces of Flemish Brabant and Walloon Brabant, and the northwestern part of the province of Liège.The Limburgish portion contains the cities of Tongeren, Sint-Truiden, Bilzen and...
moved regularly during the 17th and 18th centuries. Some communes, such as Hélécine
Hélécine
Hélécine is a Walloon municipality located in the Belgian province of Walloon Brabant. On 1 January 2006 Hélécine had a total population of 3,068. The total area is 16.62 km² which gives a population density of 185 inhabitants per km².-References:...
, switched from Dutch to French and others, such as Herstappe
Herstappe
Herstappe is a municipality located in the Belgian province of Limburg. On January 1, 2008 Herstappe had a total population of 84. The total area is 1.35 km² which gives a population density of 61 inhabitants per km². It is the least populous municipality in Belgium. Only Saint-Josse-ten-Noode...
, switched from French to Dutch. The Voeren have a long Flemish tradition and, in the Land of Herve
Land of Herve
The Land of Herve is a 420 km² natural region of Wallonia located between the Vesdre and Meuse rivers and the borders separating Belgium from the Netherlands and Germany....
, several communes which used to use Germanic dialects switched to French during the 18th century, as for example, Berneau and Warsage, both now part of Dalhem
Dalhem
Dalhem is a Walloon municipality located in the Belgian province of Liège. On January 1, 2006 Dalhem had a total population of 6,486. The total area is 36.06 km² which gives a population density of 180 inhabitants per km²....
and Saint-Jean-Sart, a hamlet
Hamlet (place)
A hamlet is usually a rural settlement which is too small to be considered a village, though sometimes the word is used for a different sort of community. Historically, when a hamlet became large enough to justify building a church, it was then classified as a village...
of Aubel
Aubel
Aubel is a Belgian municipality located in the Walloon province of Liège. On 1 January 2006 the municipality had 4,082 inhabitants. The total area is 18.83 km², giving a population density of 217 inhabitants per km²....
.
Prior to the 20th century, this language border did not merely distinguish speakers of Belgian French
Belgian French
Belgian French is the variety of French spoken mainly in the French Community of Belgium, alongside related minority regional languages such as Walloon, Picard, Champenois and Gaumais. The French spoken in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Rwanda, and Burundi, which were formerly Belgian...
, standard Dutch and standard German
German language
German is a West Germanic language, related to and classified alongside English and Dutch. With an estimated 90 – 98 million native speakers, German is one of the world's major languages and is the most widely-spoken first language in the European Union....
, as today, but between Romance and Germanic dialect continua
Dialect continuum
A dialect continuum, or dialect area, was defined by Leonard Bloomfield as a range of dialects spoken across some geographical area that differ only slightly between neighboring areas, but as one travels in any direction, these differences accumulate such that speakers from opposite ends of the...
. The Germanic sprachraum was made of different components such as West Flemish
West Flemish
West Flemish , , , Fransch vlaemsch in French Flemish) is a group of dialects or regional language related to Dutch spoken in parts of the Netherlands, Belgium, and France....
, East Flemish
East Flemish
East Flemish is a group of dialects of the Dutch language, which is a Low Franconian language. It is spoken in the province of East Flanders in Belgium, but also spoken in Zeeuws-Vlaanderen in the Netherlands.-Brabantic Expansion:...
, Brabantic, Limburgish, Ripuarian (transitional dialects between Limbourgish and Ripuarian are called Low Dietsch
Low Dietsch
Low Dietsch is a term mainly used within the Flemish terminology for the transitional Limburgish–Ripuarian dialects of a number of towns and villages in the north-east of the Belgian province of Liege, such as Gemmenich, Homburg, Montzen and Welkenraedt....
), Moselle Franconian
Moselle Franconian
Moselle Franconian is a group of West Central German dialects, part of the Central Franconian language area.It is spoken in the southern Rhineland and along the course of the Moselle River, from the Siegerland in the German state of North Rhine-Westphalia throughout western Rhineland-Palatinate and...
dialect of Trier
Trier
Trier, historically called in English Treves is a city in Germany on the banks of the Moselle. It is the oldest city in Germany, founded in or before 16 BC....
and Luxembourgish
Luxembourgish language
Luxembourgish is a High German language spoken mainly in Luxembourg. About 320,000 people worldwide speak Luxembourgish.-Language family:...
. The Romance sprachraum was made of Picard
Picard language
Picard is a language closely related to French, and as such is one of the larger group of Romance languages. It is spoken in two regions in the far north of France – Nord-Pas-de-Calais and Picardy – and in parts of the Belgian region of Wallonia, the district of Tournai and a part of...
, Walloon
Walloon language
Walloon is a Romance language which was spoken as a primary language in large portions of the Walloon Region of Belgium and some villages of Northern France until the middle of the 20th century. It belongs to the langue d'oïl language family, whose most prominent member is the French language...
(with four distinct dialects around the cities of Charleroi
Charleroi
Charleroi is a city and a municipality of Wallonia, located in the province of Hainaut, Belgium. , the total population of Charleroi was 201,593. The metropolitan area, including the outer commuter zone, covers an area of and had a total population of 522,522 as of 1 January 2008, ranking it as...
, Namur
Namur (city)
Namur is a city and municipality in Wallonia, in southern Belgium. It is both the capital of the province of Namur and of Wallonia....
, Liège
Liège
Liège is a major city and municipality of Belgium located in the province of Liège, of which it is the economic capital, in Wallonia, the French-speaking region of Belgium....
and Bastogne
Bastogne
Bastogne Luxembourgish: Baaschtnech) is a Walloon municipality of Belgium located in the province of Luxembourg in the Ardennes. The municipality of Bastogne includes the old communes of Longvilly, Noville, Villers-la-Bonne-Eau, and Wardin...
), Lorrain
Lorrain language
Lorrain is a language spoken by a minority of people in Lorraine in France and in Gaume in Belgium. It is one of the Langues d'oïl. It is classified as a regional language of France, and has the recognised status of a regional language of Wallonia...
and Champenois
Champenois
Champenois is a language spoken by a minority of people in Champagne in France and in Wallonia in Belgium. It is one of the langues d'oïl. It is classified as a regional language of France, and has the recognized status of a regional language of Wallonia....
. Due to mass education
Mass education
Mass education refers to a massive educational system funded and run by the state to educate people on the state's interest....
and the expansion of modern media such as television, the mid-20th century saw a uniformization of the different language regions leading to the domination of the standard languages in their respective domains. In Wallonia, French became the dominant, priority language (local dialects being seldom used). Elsewhere in the Low Countries, the local dialects survived better, at least in private use.
The historical language border in the Low Countries corresponds to the frontier between populations whose majorities spoke distinct languages. However, the ruling upper classes most often spoke French. As was the case in many European noble court
Noble court
The court of a monarch, or at some periods an important nobleman, is a term for the extended household and all those who regularly attended on the ruler or central figure...
s, French was historically the nobility's language. This was also the case most of the rest of the Low Countries. Several sovereigns of the region, notably including Maria Theresa of Austria
Maria Theresa of Austria
Maria Theresa Walburga Amalia Christina was the only female ruler of the Habsburg dominions and the last of the House of Habsburg. She was the sovereign of Austria, Hungary, Croatia, Bohemia, Mantua, Milan, Lodomeria and Galicia, the Austrian Netherlands and Parma...
, succeeded in making French not only the language of the court but also of their administrations. For instance, while the major part of the population of Luxembourg speaks Luxembourgish in a private context, the administrative language
Languages of Luxembourg
The linguistic situation in Luxembourg is characterised by the practice and the recognition of three official languages: French and German and the national language Luxembourgish established in law in 1984...
of Luxembourg is French. As another example, the motto of the Kingdom of the Netherlands is the French phrase: "Je maintiendrai", owing to the fact that the language of the Orange-Nassau reigning family was French until 1890. In Flanders, until the beginning of the 20th century, many upper class Flemish burghers, such as Maurice Maeterlinck
Maurice Maeterlinck
Maurice Polydore Marie Bernard Maeterlinck, also called Comte Maeterlinck from 1932, was a Belgian playwright, poet, and essayist who wrote in French. He was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1911. The main themes in his work are death and the meaning of life...
or Suzanne Lilar
Suzanne Lilar
Suzanne, Baroness Lilar was a Flemish Belgian essayist, novelist, and playwright writing in French...
, used French as their first language. Another example is the University of Ghent which was a French-speaking institution until 1930.
The language areas were established in 1963. The division into language areas was included into the Belgian Constitution
Constitution of Belgium
The Constitution of Belgium dates back to 1831. Since then Belgium has been a parliamentary monarchy that applies the principles of ministerial responsibility for the government policy and the Trias Politica. The Constitution established Belgium as a centralised unitary state...
in 1970. The border between the language areas is the so-called Belgian language or linguistic border. It is based on the actual language border between the sprachraums but is not utterly identical. Through constitutional reforms
State reform in Belgium
The term State reform in the Belgian context indicates a process towards finding constitutional and legal solutions for the problems and tensions between the different segments of the Belgian population, mostly Dutch-speakers of Flanders and French-speakers of Wallonia...
in the 1970s and 1980s, regionalisation
Regionalism (politics)
Regionalism is a term used in international relations. Regionalism also constitutes one of the three constituents of the international commercial system...
of the unitary state
Unitary state
A unitary state is a state governed as one single unit in which the central government is supreme and any administrative divisions exercise only powers that their central government chooses to delegate...
led to a three-tiered federation
Federation
A federation , also known as a federal state, is a type of sovereign state characterized by a union of partially self-governing states or regions united by a central government...
: federal
Federalism
Federalism is a political concept in which a group of members are bound together by covenant with a governing representative head. The term "federalism" is also used to describe a system of the government in which sovereignty is constitutionally divided between a central governing authority and...
, regional, and community governments were created, a compromise designed to minimize linguistic, cultural, social and economic tensions. The authority of the Regions and Communities is limited to some language areas:
- the Flemish RegionFlemish RegionThe Flemish Region is one of the three official regions of the Kingdom of Belgium—alongside the Walloon Region and the Brussels-Capital Region. Colloquially, it is usually simply referred to as Flanders, of which it is the institutional iteration within the context of the Belgian political system...
to the Dutch language area, the Walloon RegionWalloon RegionThe Walloon Region, commonly called Wallonia, is one of the three federal Regions of Belgium, and its capital is Namur. It comprises, as defined by Article 5 of the Constitution of Belgium, the provinces of Walloon Brabant, Hainaut, Liège, Luxembourg and Namur...
to the French and German language areas, the Brussels-Capital Region to the bilingual language area, - the Flemish CommunityFlemish CommunityThe term Flemish Community has two distinct, though related, meanings:...
to the Dutch and bilingual language areas, the French CommunityFrench Community of BelgiumThe French Community of Belgium is one of the three official communities in Belgium along with the Flemish Community and the German speaking Community. Although its name could suggest that it is a community of French citizens in Belgium, it is not...
to the French and bilingual language areas, and, the German-speaking CommunityGerman-speaking Community of BelgiumThe German-speaking Community of Belgium is one of the three federal communities of Belgium. Covering an area of 854 km² within the province of Liège in Wallonia, it includes nine of the eleven municipalities of the so-called East Cantons...
to the German language area.
This territorial issue, in particular around Brussels, is a source of tension between the Belgian communities.
Nationalisms and regionalisms
Belgian nationalism
Currents of Belgian nationalism began to emerge in the late 19th century, seeking to overcome the ethnic and linguistic divides and create a national culture. Historian Henri PirenneHenri Pirenne
Henri Pirenne was a Belgian historian. A medievalist of Walloon descent, he wrote a multivolume history of Belgium in French and became a national hero....
asserted that Belgian identity was not defined on racial, ethnic or linguistic lines, but in the civilizational commune of the Belgian people. Supporters of a partition of Belgium argue that the synchronized attempts to forge a national identity and culture have been unable to forestall ethno-linguistic rivalries.
Flemish movement
French was the only official language of Belgium until 1898, even though FlandersFlanders
Flanders is the community of the Flemings but also one of the institutions in Belgium, and a geographical region located in parts of present-day Belgium, France and the Netherlands. "Flanders" can also refer to the northern part of Belgium that contains Brussels, Bruges, Ghent and Antwerp...
was and still is predominantly Dutch-speaking. The government's long refusal to acknowledge Dutch as an official language led to hostilities between Flanders and the French-speaking bourgeoisie
Bourgeoisie
In sociology and political science, bourgeoisie describes a range of groups across history. In the Western world, between the late 18th century and the present day, the bourgeoisie is a social class "characterized by their ownership of capital and their related culture." A member of the...
who held both political and economic power. These hostilities gave rise to the Flemish movement
Flemish movement
The Flemish Movement is a popular term used to describe the political movement for emancipation and greater autonomy of the Belgian region of Flanders, for protection of the Dutch language, and for the over-all protection of Flemish culture and history....
, which began as a literary and cultural organization, but later became a political movement that called for legal recognition of Dutch and for social emancipation of the Flemish people
Flemish people
The Flemings or Flemish are the Dutch-speaking inhabitants of Belgium, where they are mostly found in the northern region of Flanders. They are one of two principal cultural-linguistic groups in Belgium, the other being the French-speaking Walloons...
. The 1898 Equality Law
Language legislation in Belgium
-1830: freedom of languages and linguistic coercion:One of the causes of the Belgian Revolution of the 1830s was the growing ascendancy of the Dutch language in the administration of the Southern provinces of the United Kingdom of the Netherlands...
made Dutch an official language of Belgium, but it did not become the sole official language of Flanders until 1921. The Frenchification of Brussels
Frenchification of Brussels
The Frenchification of Brussels is the transformation of Brussels, Belgium, from a Dutch-speaking city to one that is bilingual or even multilingual, with French as both the majority language and lingua franca...
was at that time in full expansion. To this day, French remains the language of the aristocracy.
While a Wallon industrial and mining base
Sillon industriel
The sillon industriel is the former industrial backbone of Wallonia and thus of Belgium. It runs across Wallonia, passing from Dour, in Borinage, in the west, to Verviers in the east, through Mons, La Louvière, Charleroi, Namur, Huy, and Liège, following the valleys of the rivers Haine, Sambre,...
developed during the 19th century, the largely agrarian Flanders area trailed in socio-economic development, leading to widespread demands for regional autonomy and the correction of imbalances in taxation, social services, and representation. The deterioration of the Walloon industrial base in the late 20th century occurred parallel to the growth of service and technological industries in Flanders, aggravating socio-economic tensions. Modern Fleming demands center over the alleged over-taxation of Flanders and insufficient autonomy and complaints over the concentration of social services in Wallonia, causing a so-called "stream of money" from Flanders to Wallonia. The Flemish movement has inspired the growth of Flemish nationalist political parties such as the Volksunie
People's Union (Belgium)
People's Union was a Belgian political party, formed in 1954 as a successor to the "Christian Flemish People's Union", an electoral alliance of Flemish nationalists....
(People's Union) which split into different parties including the Vlaams Blok
Vlaams Blok
The Vlaams Blok was a Belgian far-right and secessionist political party with an anti-immigration platform. Its ideologies embraced Flemish nationalism, calling for the independence of Flanders. From its creation in 1978, it was the most notable militant right wing of the Flemish movement. Vlaams...
(succeeded by the Vlaams Belang
Vlaams Belang
Vlaams Belang is a Belgian far-right political party in the Flemish Region and Brussels that advocates the independence of Flanders and strict limits on immigration, whereby immigrants would be obliged to adopt Flemish culture and language...
), the New Flemish Alliance (N-VA) and FlemishProgressives. While the N-VA seeks greater autonomy and favours the independence of Flanders, possibly in a confederate state, the Vlaams Belang is more clearly separatist.
Walloon/Francophone movement
The Walloon movement arose in the 19th century along with the language disputes; French-speakers sought the preservation of the French language and culture as the defining creed of the country. French-speaking politicians (who were sometimes elected in Flanders) and other influential citizens opposed the Flemish demands for the recognition of Dutch and wished to maintain a centralized government to prevent regionalization. On the other hand, the Walloon politician Jules DestréeJules Destrée
Jules Destrée was a Walloon lawyer, cultural critic and socialist politician. The trials subsequent to the strikes of 1886 determined his commitment within the Belgian Labour Party. He wrote a Letter to the King in 1912, which is seen as the founding declaration of the Walloon movement...
reacted in 1912 to the process of minorisation of Wallonia and asked explicitly for a partition of Belgium along linguistic lines. However, Destrée was using the word separation in French in the sense of federalization , and not in the sense of complete partition. The New York Times
The New York Times
The New York Times is an American daily newspaper founded and continuously published in New York City since 1851. The New York Times has won 106 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any news organization...
explained that Destrée was afraid of the domination of the Flemings within Belgian institutions.
| Governments | From | To | Flemish ministers | Ministers from Brussels | Walloon ministers |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| A. Beernaert Auguste Marie Francois Beernaert Auguste Marie François Beernaert was the 14th Prime Minister of Belgium from October 1884 to March 1894.... |
60% | 14% | 26% | ||
| J. de Burlet Jules de Burlet Jules Philippe Marie de Burlet was a Belgian Catholic Party politician.Born in Ixelles, de Burlet was educated as a lawyer. He practised law in Nivelles, where he made his home, and he served as mayor of the town from 1872 to 1891.From 1884 he represented the Nivelles constituency in the Belgian... |
75% | 9% | 16% | ||
| P. de Smet de Naeyer Paul de Smet de Naeyer Paul Joseph, Count de Smet de Naeyer was a Belgian Catholic Party politician.Born in Ghent, son of a cotton industrialist, he was himself also an industrialist and a banker... (1) |
87% | 0% | 13% | ||
| J. Vandenpeereboom Jules Vandenpeereboom Jules Henri Pierre François Vandenpeereboom was a Belgian Catholic Party politician.Vandenpeereboom was born in Kortrijk and educated as a lawyer... |
84% | 0% | 16% | ||
| P. de Smet de Naeyer Paul de Smet de Naeyer Paul Joseph, Count de Smet de Naeyer was a Belgian Catholic Party politician.Born in Ghent, son of a cotton industrialist, he was himself also an industrialist and a banker... (2) |
76% | 0% | 24% | ||
| J. de Trooz Jules de Trooz Jules Henri Ghislain Marie, Baron de Trooz was a Belgian Catholic Party politician.De Trooz was born in Leuven, and had studied philosophy before entering politics. He represented Leuven in the Belgian Chamber of People's Representatives from 1899 onwards, serving as Education and Interior minister... |
67% | 11% | 22% | ||
| F. Schollaert Frans Schollaert François Victor Marie Ghislain Schollaert was a Belgian Catholic Party politician.Born in Wilsele, Schollaert trained as a lawyer and practiced in Leuven. He served as head of the Flemish farmer's union, the Boerenbond... |
57% | 22% | 21% | ||
| Ch. de Broqueville Charles de Broqueville Charles Marie Pierre Albert, Count de Broqueville was the 20th Prime Minister of Belgium, serving during World War I. He was born in Postel, Belgium. He was the leader of Belgium's Catholic Party, and he served as prime minister between 1911 and 1918... |
42% | 22% | 36% |
The Flemish historian Maarten van Ginderachter wrote that the Walloons were "excluded from the national power, between 1884 and 1902 there was only one Walloon in the Belgian government"
After the division of Belgium into two clearly separate linguistic areas, and after the economic decline of Wallonia, two more or less separate currents have formed. One is a more regional Walloon movement, demanding to maintain the solidarity between the richer north and the poorer south, but also increasingly stressing the separate cultural identity of Wallonia. Another current is merely Francophone and pro-Belgian, but not regional as such, mainly based on the French-speakers of Brussels and especially of the surrounding rim municipalities which are effectively suburbs of Brussels but situated in Flanders. The two movements have in common the support of the French language, support of the Belgian state and opposition to further federal devolution. A minority of Walloons, however, support increased independence. Flemish nationalists have claimed that the French-speaking "Belgicists" of Brussels and its suburbs do not have common interests with the Walloons, but that these two parties have formed a quid-pro-quo alliance to oppose the Dutch-speaking majority. According to this analysis, Walloon politicians would allegedly give political support to the French-speaking politicians of Brussels (and its surroundings) in return for receiving economic support to Wallonia.
Since the 1960s, Belgian political parties and civic organizations have witnessed bifurcation of membership and organizations between Walloon and Flanders. Ethnic tensions affect the working of local governments, which often pass laws prohibiting the use of the language of the respective minority populations in official functions. For example, municipal council meetings in Flanders must take place in Dutch, even if a majority of the council is French-speaking. On the other hand, Dutch-speaking citizens of the Flemish municipalities close to Brussels claim their position is being undermined by the minority rights of French-speaking settlers. Significant pressures in living conditions have kept the two main communities separate and confined to their majority regions; stark ethnic and linguistic segregation has emerged in Brussels, the capital and largest city of the country. Ethnic tensions have affected some of the city's surrounding municipalities, which are situated in Flanders, but have had a great influx of monolingual French-speakers as a result of suburbanisation. These Dutch-speaking "facility municipalities" are obliged to offer local government services in French, meaning health-care and public amenities are divided on linguistic lines, and in some municipalities the original French-speaking minority is believed to have become a majority.
Brussels
The main reason for Brussels being mainly French-speaking was the low social prestige of the Dutch language in Belgium at the time. French was at that time the language of the administration, government, culture, law and education. From 1880 onwards, more and more Dutch-speaking people became bilingual and passed only French on to their children, resulting in a rise of monolingual French-speakers after 1910. Halfway through the 20th century the number of monolingual French-speakers carried the day over the (mostly) bilingual Flemish inhabitants. Only since the 1960s, after the fixation of the Belgian language border and the socio-economic development of Flanders was in full effect, could Dutch stem the tide of increasing French use.The status of Brussels in a partitioned Belgium is uncertain and a source of considerable debate.
Union with Flanders
One idea is that the city rejoins Flanders in which Brussels is geographically and economically embedded. Proposals include a guarantee that the linguistic rights of the French-speaking population in Brussels are safeguarded.
Union with Wallonia
Another idea is that Brussels would form a union with Wallonia, often referred to as Wallobrux. One problem is that both regions do not border each other, as Brussels is an enclave in Flanders. Some French-speaking politicians therefore demand that a corridor is made between the two territories (see the topic of the extension of Brussels below)
City-state scenario
Another idea is that Brussels would become a "European [capital] district", similar to Washington D.C. or the Australian Capital Territory
Australian Capital Territory
The Australian Capital Territory, often abbreviated ACT, is the capital territory of the Commonwealth of Australia and is the smallest self-governing internal territory...
, run by the EU rather than Flanders or Wallonia. The Union's structure has however no experience at governing at this level at present. To fulfill this solution in practice, Brussels would probably need to be an independent city-state
City-state
A city-state is an independent or autonomous entity whose territory consists of a city which is not administered as a part of another local government.-Historical city-states:...
which could join the EU on equal footing with other EU member states. The possible status of Brussels as a "city-state" has been suggested by Charles Picqué
Charles Picqué
Charles Picqué is a Belgian, French-speaking politician. He is currently serving his second term as Minister-President of the Brussels Capital-Region....
, Minister-President
Minister-President of the Brussels-Capital Region
The Minister-President of the Brussels Capital-Region is the person leading the Government of the Brussels-Capital Region. The post is appointed for 5 years along with 4 ministers and 3 "state" secretaries...
of the Brussels-Capital Region, who sees a tax on the EU institutions
Institutions of the European Union
The European Union is governed by seven institutions. Article 13 of Treaty on European Union lists them in the following order: the European Parliament, the European Council, the Council of the European Union, the European Commission, the Court of Justice of the European Union, the European...
as a way of enriching the city. However, the Belgian issue has generated very little discussion within the EU bodies.
Extension of Brussels
Municipalities of Belgium
Belgium comprises 589 municipalities grouped into five provinces in each of two regions and into a third region, the Brussels-Capital Region, comprising 19 municipalities that do not belong to a province...
within Flemish Brabant and Walloon Brabant
Walloon Brabant
Walloon Brabant is a province of Wallonia in Belgium. It borders on the province of Flemish Brabant and the provinces of Liège, Namur and Hainaut . Its capital is Wavre...
. This proposal is not necessarily linked to a split-up of Belgium.
Some have, however, suggested that these wealthy areas would make the city financially viable as an independent state, potentially give it around 1.5 million inhabitants, an airport
Brussels Airport
Brussels Airport is an international airport northeast of Brussels, Belgium. The airport is partially in Zaventem and partially in the Diegem area of Machelen, both located in the Flemish Region of Belgium.Brussels Airport currently consists of 54 contact gates, and a total of 109 gates...
and forest
Sonian Forest
The Sonian Forest is a forest that lies across the south-eastern part of Brussels, Belgium.The forest lies in the Flemish municipalities of Sint-Genesius-Rode, Hoeilaart, Overijse and Tervuren, in Uccle, Watermael-Boitsfort, Auderghem and Woluwe-Saint-Pierre in the Brussels-Capital Region and in...
within its boundaries, and make it three or four times larger than the current capital region. Currently, Brussels is the most important seat of EU institutions, but the EU has no formal capital. It has been claimed that a large and independent status may help Brussels advance its claim as the capital of the EU.
The enlargement of the Brussels capital region is supported by many French-speakers in the Flemish municipalities with facilities for French-speakers surrounding Brussels. As a result of suburbanisation and an influx of French-speakers and EU officials from Brussels, these municipalities have in recent decades become increasingly French-speaking to an extent that French-speakers now form a majority in some municipalities. In contrast, an extension of the bilingual region is out of the question for the Dutch-speaking inhabitants of these communities and for virtually all Flemish political parties, who say that these newer inhabitants should respect and adjust to the language of the region they're moving into.
Similar to a "Greater Brussels" region, the electoral district of Brussels-Halle-Vilvoorde
Brussels-Halle-Vilvoorde
Brussels-Halle-Vilvoorde is a Belgian electoral and judicial arrondissement in the center of the country, encompassing:* the officially bilingual Brussels-Capital Region, which coincides...
consists of Brussels and 35 surrounding municipalities in Flanders. This district is the only remaining entity in Belgium that does not coincide with provincial borders, and as such it has been deemed unconstitutional by the Belgian Constitutional Court. This has been a conflict issue for years and a major political problem in the cabinet formation crisis of 2007–2008
2007–2008 Belgian government formation
The 2007–2008 Belgian government formation followed the general election of 10 June 2007, and consisted of a period of negotiation in which the Flemish parties Flemish Liberal Democratic , Christian Democratic and Flemish and New Flemish Alliance , and the French-speaking parties Reformist...
.
Condominium
Another proposition is the establishment of a Flemish-Walloon condominium
Condominium (international law)
In international law, a condominium is a political territory in or over which two or more sovereign powers formally agree to share equally dominium and exercise their rights jointly, without dividing it up into 'national' zones.Although a condominium has always been...
of Brussels, where both sides govern Brussels together. This idea is in general popular among Flemish politicians, such as socialist politician Louis Tobback
Louis Tobback
Louis Marie Joseph Tobback is a Belgian politician. Tobback is a Flemish social democrat and member of the political party SP.A. He is currently the mayor of Leuven. He graduated in Romance philology at the Vrije Universiteit Brussel....
and nationalist Bart De Wever
Bart De Wever
Bart Albert Liliane De Wever is a Belgian politician and since 2004 has been the president of the New Flemish Alliance , a Flemish party that strives for an independent Flanders in a united Europe. He has also been a member of the Flemish parliament since 2004...
.
German-speaking Community
The small German-speaking Community of BelgiumGerman-speaking Community of Belgium
The German-speaking Community of Belgium is one of the three federal communities of Belgium. Covering an area of 854 km² within the province of Liège in Wallonia, it includes nine of the eleven municipalities of the so-called East Cantons...
in the east is in fact more an observer than a player in the difficult negotiations between Flanders and Wallonia. The region of Eupen-Malmedy
Eupen-Malmedy
Eupen-Malmedy, or the East Cantons , is a group of cantons in Belgium, composed of the former Prussian districts of Malmedy and Eupen, together with the Neutral Moresnet...
was given to Belgium in the aftermath of the first World War. The city of Malmedy
Malmedy
Malmedy is a municipality of Belgium. It lies in the country's Walloon Region, Province of Liège. It belongs to the French Community of Belgium, within which it is French-speaking with facilities for German-speakers. On January 1, 2006 Malmedy had a total population of 11,829...
and the surrounding villages are francophone. German is spoken in Eupen and around the small city of St. Vith in the Belgian Eifel
Belgian Eifel
The Belgian Eifel is that part of the North and West Eifel that lies on the Belgian side of the Germany-Belgium border. The term is not universally used, because the boundary between the Eifel and the Ardennes in the area of the High Fens is not clearly defined.The following areas may be...
. The territory is about 850 km². Approximately 72,000 people live there. The conflict between Walloons and Flemings provided the German-speaking Community with considerable autonomy. Although the region is too small to play a role in the negotiations, it obtained an autonomy similar to that of its larger neighbors. After long lasting discrimation within French-dominated Belgium, the German-speaking Belgians now have a parliament and a government with four ministers and a minister-president
Minister-President
A minister-president is the head of government in a number of European countries or subnational governments, in which a parliamentary or semi-presidential system of government prevails, who presides over the council of ministers...
.
Four theoretical scenarios are usually considered in the event that a partition of Belgium would occur. Eupen and St. Vith are part of the province of Liège. A status quo would mean that the Community would stay unified to Wallonia. The question is open as to whether or not the German-speakers would keep their cultural and political rights in the long term. The second possibility would be a reunification with Germany. The opponents to this idea argue that the autonomy of the region would then be lost. The end of discrimination within the region has created a strong cohesion of the population and some would prefer the creation of an independent state rather than reunification with Germany. They argue that the new country would be larger and more populated than Liechtenstein
Liechtenstein
The Principality of Liechtenstein is a doubly landlocked alpine country in Central Europe, bordered by Switzerland to the west and south and by Austria to the east. Its area is just over , and it has an estimated population of 35,000. Its capital is Vaduz. The biggest town is Schaan...
. Opponents to this scenario say this would lead to the creation of a new tax haven
Tax haven
A tax haven is a state or a country or territory where certain taxes are levied at a low rate or not at all while offering due process, good governance and a low corruption rate....
that the European Union does not need. The last option would be to merge with Luxembourg
Luxembourg
Luxembourg , officially the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg , is a landlocked country in western Europe, bordered by Belgium, France, and Germany. It has two principal regions: the Oesling in the North as part of the Ardennes massif, and the Gutland in the south...
. Supporters of this scenario underline that many from St. Vith currently commute to Luxembourg and that a union with the rich Grand Duchy
Grand duchy
A grand duchy, sometimes referred to as a grand dukedom, is a territory whose head of state is a monarch, either a grand duke or grand duchess.Today Luxembourg is the only remaining grand duchy...
would be economically profitable. Minister-President Karl-Heinz Lambertz
Karl-Heinz Lambertz
Karl-Heinz Lambertz , is a jurist and politician, currently the leader of the Government of the German-speaking Community of Belgium. He is noted for voicing an outspoken demand for his community, numbering about 70,000 around Eupen, to be separated from Wallonia and be recognised as a autonomous...
was once said to have supported such a project. He, however, has refuted this and has committed himself to the continued union with Belgium. In an interview with the German TV-channel ZDF in February 2011, he listed the four aforementioned options concerning the future of the German-speaking Community.
21st century position of the political parties
| Affiliation | Members | Language | Ideology | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| New Flemish Alliance | 27 | Dutch Dutch language Dutch is a West Germanic language and the native language of the majority of the population of the Netherlands, Belgium, and Suriname, the three member states of the Dutch Language Union. Most speakers live in the European Union, where it is a first language for about 23 million and a second... |
Conservatism Conservatism Conservatism is a political and social philosophy that promotes the maintenance of traditional institutions and supports, at the most, minimal and gradual change in society. Some conservatives seek to preserve things as they are, emphasizing stability and continuity, while others oppose modernism... & Flemish separatism Separatism Separatism is the advocacy of a state of cultural, ethnic, tribal, religious, racial, governmental or gender separation from the larger group. While it often refers to full political secession, separatist groups may seek nothing more than greater autonomy... |
|
| Socialist Party | 26 | French French language French is a Romance language spoken as a first language in France, the Romandy region in Switzerland, Wallonia and Brussels in Belgium, Monaco, the regions of Quebec and Acadia in Canada, and by various communities elsewhere. Second-language speakers of French are distributed throughout many parts... |
Social democracy Social democracy Social democracy is a political ideology of the center-left on the political spectrum. Social democracy is officially a form of evolutionary reformist socialism. It supports class collaboration as the course to achieve socialism... |
|
| Reformist Movement | 18 | French | Liberalism Liberalism Liberalism is the belief in the importance of liberty and equal rights. Liberals espouse a wide array of views depending on their understanding of these principles, but generally, liberals support ideas such as constitutionalism, liberal democracy, free and fair elections, human rights,... & Regionalism Regionalism (politics) Regionalism is a term used in international relations. Regionalism also constitutes one of the three constituents of the international commercial system... (FDF) |
|
| Christian Democratic and Flemish | 17 | Dutch | Christian democracy Christian Democracy Christian democracy is a political ideology that seeks to apply Christian principles to public policy. It emerged in nineteenth-century Europe under the influence of conservatism and Catholic social teaching... |
|
| Open Flemish Liberals and Democrats | 13 | Dutch | Liberalism & Social liberalism Social liberalism Social liberalism is the belief that liberalism should include social justice. It differs from classical liberalism in that it believes the legitimate role of the state includes addressing economic and social issues such as unemployment, health care, and education while simultaneously expanding... |
|
| Socialist Party Different | 13 | Dutch | Social democracy | |
| Flemish Interest Vlaams Belang Vlaams Belang is a Belgian far-right political party in the Flemish Region and Brussels that advocates the independence of Flanders and strict limits on immigration, whereby immigrants would be obliged to adopt Flemish culture and language... |
12 | Dutch | Far-right politics & Flemish separatism | |
| Humanist Democratic Centre | 9 | French | Christian democracy | |
| Ecolo Ecolo Ecolo is a French-speaking Belgian green political party in Wallonia, Brussels and the German-speaking Community of Belgium... |
8 | French | Green politics Green politics Green politics is a political ideology that aims for the creation of an ecologically sustainable society rooted in environmentalism, social liberalism, and grassroots democracy... |
|
| Green | 5 | Dutch | Green politics | |
| List Dedecker | 1 | Dutch | Conservative liberalism Conservative liberalism Conservative liberalism is a variant of liberalism, combining liberal values and policies with conservative stances, or, more simply, representing the right-wing of the liberal movement.... & Republicanism Republicanism Republicanism is the ideology of governing a nation as a republic, where the head of state is appointed by means other than heredity, often elections. The exact meaning of republicanism varies depending on the cultural and historical context... |
|
| People's Party People's Party (Belgium) The People's Party , abbreviated to PP, is a conservative liberal political party in Belgium. Primarily a French-speaking party, it considers itself to be to the right of the Mouvement Réformateur, Belgium's main centre-right French-speaking party.... |
1 | French | Conservative liberalism Conservative liberalism Conservative liberalism is a variant of liberalism, combining liberal values and policies with conservative stances, or, more simply, representing the right-wing of the liberal movement.... & Federalism Federalism Federalism is a political concept in which a group of members are bound together by covenant with a governing representative head. The term "federalism" is also used to describe a system of the government in which sovereignty is constitutionally divided between a central governing authority and... |
|
| Total | 150 | |||
The parties with long lasting participation in the Belgian governments, that is the Christian Democrats, the Liberals and the Socialists, as well as the Green parties, usually refuse to speak openly about a possible partitioning of Belgium. This question seems to be taboo on the Belgian political scene and is only discussed from time to time by main stream politicians in order to menace the other community, not unlike the atomic bomb threat during the Cold War
Cold War
The Cold War was the continuing state from roughly 1946 to 1991 of political conflict, military tension, proxy wars, and economic competition between the Communist World—primarily the Soviet Union and its satellite states and allies—and the powers of the Western world, primarily the United States...
context. In particular, on 6 September 2010, after long lasting negotiation for the formation of the federal government, most leaders of the French-speaking Socialist Party simultaneously declared that they now consider the partition of Belgium as a realistic alternative solution to the Belgian problems. This openly separatist point of view expressed by the French-speaking Socialists is analysed by some, including French-speaking liberals and most Flemish politicians, as an idle threat which aims at forcing progress in communatarian negotiations. The heart of the problem is not the partition of Belgium but its federalization also called regionalization or communitarization. This process of devolution
Devolution
Devolution is the statutory granting of powers from the central government of a sovereign state to government at a subnational level, such as a regional, local, or state level. Devolution can be mainly financial, e.g. giving areas a budget which was formerly administered by central government...
, which began in the 1960s due to the pressure of the Flemish movement
Flemish movement
The Flemish Movement is a popular term used to describe the political movement for emancipation and greater autonomy of the Belgian region of Flanders, for protection of the Dutch language, and for the over-all protection of Flemish culture and history....
and, to a lesser extent, of the Walloon movement
Walloon Movement
The Walloon Movement is an umbrella term for all Belgian political movements that either assert the existence of a Walloon identity or defend French culture and language within Belgium. The movement began as a defence of the primacy of French but later gained political and socio-economic objectives...
, is called in the Belgian context the state reform
State reform in Belgium
The term State reform in the Belgian context indicates a process towards finding constitutional and legal solutions for the problems and tensions between the different segments of the Belgian population, mostly Dutch-speakers of Flanders and French-speakers of Wallonia...
. While most Francophones argue that the state reform is unnecessary, virtually all Flemish political parties demand a severe reform of the Belgian state. In particular the N-VA and a part of the Flemish movement want to apply the so-called Maddens Doctrine
Maddens Doctrine
The Maddens Doctrine or Strategy refers, in Belgian politics, to a strategy suggested by Bart Maddens to achieve progress in the state reform....
in order to enforce the Francophones to require such a state reform.
Socialist Party Different (sp.a), the Flemish socialist party, states on its website that it believes an independent Flanders is not necessary. It does support the devolution of a number of additional responsibilities, such as the railways or the policy of employment. [Open Vlaamse Liberalen en Democraten|Open Flemish Liberals and Democrats]] (Open VLD) want more socio-economic and financial autonomy for Flanders, a homogenous division of responsibilities, more cooperation between the communities and regions and a strong federal state. Green!, the Flemish green party, wants another round in the state reform, but only if it leads to more solidarity, a better functioning of the institutions and more democracy. It states on its website that it doesn’t want to reform for the purpose of reforming. Green! wants Belgium to remain a federal state and considers the cooperation between different communities within one state to be a challenge rather than a problem. It also pleads for federal loyalty and respect for the rulings of the Constitutional Court and wants to see a more homogenous division of responsibilities.
The Francophone Socialist Party (PS) and Christian democrats (cdH) promote the conservation of the current Belgian welfare state
Welfare state
A welfare state is a "concept of government in which the state plays a key role in the protection and promotion of the economic and social well-being of its citizens. It is based on the principles of equality of opportunity, equitable distribution of wealth, and public responsibility for those...
, and therefore oppose any further regionalisation of the federal social policies
Social policy
Social policy primarily refers to guidelines, principles, legislation and activities that affect the living conditions conducive to human welfare. Thus, social policy is that part of public policy that has to do with social issues...
. The Reformist Movement, the Francophone liberal party, stresses in its manifesto that the Flemings are intending to split most of the solidarity mechanisms that exist between the Belgians. They also state that they minimize the importance of the Brussels-Capital Region as a constitutional component of the federal state. Their approach is to build strong links between the different components of the French-speaking part of Belgium, including Brussels and Wallonnia as well as the municipalities with a French-speaking presence around Brussels and in Voeren. The aim of this approach is to create a strong autonomous Francophone component within the federal state. Écolo, the Francophone Green party, supports an improvement of the political links between the communities. They suggest, among other things, the creation of a national electoral arrondissement
Arrondissements of Belgium
The federalized country Belgium geographically consists of 3 regions, of which only Flemish Region and Walloon Region are subdivided into 5 provinces each; the Brussels-Capital Region is neither a province nor is it part of one....
for the election of part of the federal parliament.
Outright support
In Flanders, several large parties openly call for a partition of the country. The largest is the far-right party Flemish InterestVlaams Belang
Vlaams Belang is a Belgian far-right political party in the Flemish Region and Brussels that advocates the independence of Flanders and strict limits on immigration, whereby immigrants would be obliged to adopt Flemish culture and language...
. Other openly separatist but more mainstream parties emerged recently: New Flemish Alliance, List Dedecker. In Wallonia and Brussels, only the Wallonia-France Rally party is openly separatist. This party, which has no elected representative at either the national or regional level, promotes the partition of Belgium and a union of Wallonia and Brussels with France
Rattachism
Rattachisme is a part of the Walloon movement that advocates the unification of Wallonia with France....
.
Several small parties with no or very few seats at the parliament campaign explicitly for the unity of the Belgian state. The conservative Belgian Union promotes a stronger federal government and a return to the Belgian unitary state which existed in the 1960s. The far-left Workers' Party of Belgium also supports the unity of Belgium since it considers the federalisation of the country as an employers' attack at the welfare state and the unity of the trade union
Trade union
A trade union, trades union or labor union is an organization of workers that have banded together to achieve common goals such as better working conditions. The trade union, through its leadership, bargains with the employer on behalf of union members and negotiates labour contracts with...
s. The Francophone far-right Front National is also explicitly opposed to the partition of Belgium.
There are several Walloon representatives of the Socialist Party in the Walloon Parliament who are in favour of the Walloon Regionalism, also in the Walloon Government such as Eliane Tillieux and Jean-Claude Marcourt
Jean-Claude Marcourt
Jean-Claude Marcourt is since 2009 the Vice-Minister-President, minister of Economy and Foreign Affairs of the Walloon government and Vice-Minister-President and Minister of Higher Education of the Government of the French Community. He is member of the Belgian Francophone Socialist Party...
for instance, i.e. two socialist ministers on the four of the Walloon Government. The Walloon wing of the General Federation of Belgian Labour
General Federation of Belgian Labour
-External links:* Official site.*...
are in favour of more powers for the Regions.
2007 government formation
The Belgian general election, 2007Belgian general election, 2007
The 2007 Belgian general election took place on Sunday 10 June 2007. Voters went to the polls in order to elect new members for the Chamber of Representatives and Senate.Eligible voters were Belgian citizens 18 years and older...
, resulted in no political party or coalition gaining enough seats to form a working majority. The crisis continued for 196 days, leaving Belgium without a government with a popular mandate. While prime minister Guy Verhofstadt
Guy Verhofstadt
Guy Verhofstadt is a Belgian politician who was the 47th Prime Minister of Belgium from 1999 to 2008. He is currently a Member of the European Parliament and leader of the Group of the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe.- Early career :...
's lame duck
Lame duck (politics)
A lame duck is an elected official who is approaching the end of his or her tenure, and especially an official whose successor has already been elected.-Description:The status can be due to*having lost a re-election bid...
ministry remained in power as caretaker
Caretaker government
Caretaker government is a type of government that rules temporarily. A caretaker government is often set up following a war until stable democratic rule can be restored, or installed, in which case it is often referred to as a provisional government...
, several leading politicians were nominated without success by the King to build a stable governmental coalition. Flemish politician Yves Leterme
Yves Leterme
Yves Camille Désiré Leterme is a Flemish Belgian politician, a leader of the Christian Democratic and Flemish party , and the 48th Prime Minister of Belgium.Leterme was the Prime Minister of Belgium from March 2008 to December 2008...
had been the prime candidate to lead the national government, but a political gaffe would prove to be his undoing. Asked to sing the Belgian national anthem in French at National Day celebrations, instead of the Brabançonne Leterme started to sing the Marseillaise
La Marseillaise
"La Marseillaise" is the national anthem of France. The song, originally titled "Chant de guerre pour l'Armée du Rhin" was written and composed by Claude Joseph Rouget de Lisle in 1792. The French National Convention adopted it as the Republic's anthem in 1795...
, France's anthem. Leterme's error drew condemnation from the different communities, aggravating distrust and separatist sentiments.
Eventually, after 196 days, the parties finally succeeded in forming a new government. In December 2008, another crisis related to the Fortis case
Fortis (finance)
Fortis N.V./S.A. was a company active in insurance, banking and investment management. In 2007 it was the 20th largest business in the world by revenue but after encountering severe problems in the financial crisis of 2008, most of the company was sold in parts, with only insurance activities...
, erupted, again destabilising the country and resulting in the resignation of Belgian Prime Minister Yves Leterme
Yves Leterme
Yves Camille Désiré Leterme is a Flemish Belgian politician, a leader of the Christian Democratic and Flemish party , and the 48th Prime Minister of Belgium.Leterme was the Prime Minister of Belgium from March 2008 to December 2008...
. The new Herman Van Rompuy
Herman Van Rompuy
Herman Achille Van Rompuy is the first long-term and full-time President of the European Council...
-led government brought a brief period of fragile stability, but ended when Van Rompuy left his office to become the first full-term President of the European Council
President of the European Council
The President of the European Council is a principal representative of the European Union on the world stage, and the person presiding over and driving forward the work of the European Council...
. The succeeding Leterme II government
Leterme II Government
The Leterme II Government was the federal government of Belgium from 24 November 2009 to 26 April 2010. it is still the caretaker government. It took office when the Flemish Christian Democrat Yves Leterme was sworn in as Prime Minister. It followed the Van Rompuy I Government which ended...
fell in April 2010 over the lack of progress on resolving the BHV issue.
Although most Flemish political parties describe their demands as limited to seeking greater regional autonomy and decentralization of government (save for members of the Vlaams Belang
Vlaams Belang
Vlaams Belang is a Belgian far-right political party in the Flemish Region and Brussels that advocates the independence of Flanders and strict limits on immigration, whereby immigrants would be obliged to adopt Flemish culture and language...
party, who called for a splitting of the country and claim of a national identity, culture
Culture of Belgium
A discussion of Belgian culture requires the language and what they eat discussing both those aspects of cultural life shared by 'all' or most of the Belgians, regardless of what language they speak, and also, the differences between the main cultural communities: the Flemish people from...
and institutions, and claim Belgium is an "unnatural" and "artificial" state, formed simply as a buffer between France and other European powers during 19th century conflicts), some public opinion polls performed during the communautary crisis showed that approximately 46% of Flemish people support secession from Belgium. Other surveys indicated only 12% of the Flemings want the end of Belgium, whereas 37% want more responsibilities to be devolved to communities and the regions. Many French-speakers maintain that there is sufficient regional autonomy and that Flemish demands are exaggerated and separatist in nature. However, the diversity of Brussels and its significant economic and geopolitical importance in the Western hemisphere as the headquarters of the European Union
European Union
The European Union is an economic and political union of 27 independent member states which are located primarily in Europe. The EU traces its origins from the European Coal and Steel Community and the European Economic Community , formed by six countries in 1958...
and NATO, make it a unifying force, making partition unlikely at least for the near future. In response to heightening domestic and international speculation regarding the country's future, the Belgian government launched a public relations campaign through its embassies worldwide to assuage concerns and fight speculation that Belgium's division is impending, as indicated by numerous recent public opinion polls. The King of the Belgians rejected notions and speculation over a change in the nature of the Belgian state as part of proposals for the formation of a working government.
On November 18, 2007, an estimated 25,000 people marched in Brussels to support the unity of Belgium. The march was organized by Marie-Claire Houart
Marie-Claire Houart
Marie-Claire Houard is a Belgian civil servant from the city of Liège committed to preserving the unity of Belgium amidst the on-going political crisis...
whose petition calling for unity was signed by 140,000 Belgians.
The Belgian Chamber of Representatives on November 22, 2007, rejected the consideration of a proposed resolution to dissolve Belgium. The resolution had been introduced on October 29 by Bart Laeremans
Bart Laeremans
Bart Laeremans is since 21 May 1995 member of the Belgian Chamber of Representatives for the Vlaams Belang for the constituency Brussels-Halle-Vilvoorde.-Career:...
, Gerolf Annemans
Gerolf Annemans
Gerolf Emma Jozef Annemans is a Belgian politician. He is member of Vlaams Belang, a nationalist, conservative and secessionist political party.- Political career :...
, Filip De Man
Filip De Man
Filip Emiel Julien De Man is a Flemish politician and journalist. He has an M.A. in philosophy and currently lives in Vilvoorde, Flemish Brabant...
and Linda Vissers
Linda Vissers
Linda Vissers is a member of the Flemish Parliament from the right-wing, separatist Vlaams Belang party of Belgium.-References:...
(Vlaams Belang
Vlaams Belang
Vlaams Belang is a Belgian far-right political party in the Flemish Region and Brussels that advocates the independence of Flanders and strict limits on immigration, whereby immigrants would be obliged to adopt Flemish culture and language...
) and called upon the federal government
Belgian federal government
The Cabinet of Belgium is the executive branch of the Belgian federal government, consisting of ministers and secretaries of state drawn from the political parties which form the governing coalition. Formally, the ministers are appointed by the King...
to "take without delay the measures necessary for the purpose of preparing the break-up of the Belgian State, so the three communities — Flemings, Walloons and Germans — can go their own separate ways." Most Flemish parties voted against the consideration of the proposal. The three members of the New Flemish Alliance abstained, together with three members of CD&V
Christian Democratic and Flemish
The Christian Democratic and Flemish is a political party of Belgium, formerly called Christian People's Party...
.
In 2007, Polls in Editie NL, a Dutch news program on the commercial station RTL 4
RTL 4
RTL 4 is a commercial television station in the Netherlands. It is the most-watched commercial station in the country, popular especially with those aged between 20 and 49. The station has three sister tv channels: RTL 5, RTL 7 and RTL 8...
and newspaper De Dag (The Day) in the Netherlands showed that between 45% and 77% of Dutch nationals (the results of the two different polls) would support a merger of their country with Flanders. However a similar poll performed by Synovate Nederland in 2010, showed that only 20% of the Dutch support a union between the Netherlands and Flanders. A comparable poll held in 2007 in France showed that a majority of French citizens would support a merger of Wallonia with France, if Belgium ceased to exist. However, French politicians have ruled out any interference into the inner Belgian debate.
2010 fall of government and new government formation
Yves Leterme
Yves Camille Désiré Leterme is a Flemish Belgian politician, a leader of the Christian Democratic and Flemish party , and the 48th Prime Minister of Belgium.Leterme was the Prime Minister of Belgium from March 2008 to December 2008...
offered his resignation to King Albert II
Albert II of Belgium
Albert II is the current reigning King of the Belgians, a constitutional monarch. He is a member of the royal house "of Belgium"; formerly this house was named Saxe-Coburg-Gotha...
. An election
Belgian general election, 2010
General elections were held in Belgium on 13 June 2010. After the fall of the previous government over the withdrawal of Open Flemish Liberals and Democrats from the government the King dissolved the legislature and called new elections...
were then called for June 13, amid fears that coalition-building would once again be protracted. In Flanders, the New Flemish Alliance (N-VA) party won a plurality with 27.8% of votes, while the winning party in Wallonia was the Socialist Party. Both parties, along with other parties, negotiated a state reform during the 2010 Belgian government formation
2010 Belgian government formation
Following the Belgian general election held on 13 June 2010, a process of cabinet formation started in Belgium. The election produced a very fragmented political landscape, with 11 parties elected to the Chamber of Representatives, none of which have more than 20 percent of the seats...
.
Although seven parties (N-VA, CD&V, sp.a, Groen!, PS, cdH, and Ecolo) were participating, the negotiations were led by the main winners, Bart De Wever
Bart De Wever
Bart Albert Liliane De Wever is a Belgian politician and since 2004 has been the president of the New Flemish Alliance , a Flemish party that strives for an independent Flanders in a united Europe. He has also been a member of the Flemish parliament since 2004...
(N-VA) and Elio Di Rupo
Elio Di Rupo
Elio Di Rupo is a Belgian social-democratic politician and the Party Leader of the Socialist Party .-Biography:...
(PS). The large number of implied parties was due not only to the multipolar Belgian political landscape but also to the will of the Flemish parties to reform the state
State reform in Belgium
The term State reform in the Belgian context indicates a process towards finding constitutional and legal solutions for the problems and tensions between the different segments of the Belgian population, mostly Dutch-speakers of Flanders and French-speakers of Wallonia...
and, hence, to change the constitution
Constitution of Belgium
The Constitution of Belgium dates back to 1831. Since then Belgium has been a parliamentary monarchy that applies the principles of ministerial responsibility for the government policy and the Trias Politica. The Constitution established Belgium as a centralised unitary state...
, which can be modified according only to very restrictive rules including a two-third majority vote in the Lower House.
Some in the international media saw this election as evidence that Belgium would be partitioned. On September 9, 2010, a poll taken by RTL
RTL Television
Rtl.de' redirects here. For other uses, see RTL.RTL Television , or simply RTL, is a German commercial television station distributed via cable and satellite along with DVB-T , in larger population centres...
showed that a third of the French-speaking population supported the beginning of preparations for the country's partition. On September 13, Het Laatste Nieuws
Het Laatste Nieuws
Het Laatste Nieuws is a Dutch language newspaper based in Brussels, Belgium. It was founded by Julius Hoste Sr. on 7 June 1888. It is now part of De Persgroep, and has a circulation of 292,410 copies, making it the most popular newspaper in Flanders and Belgium.- Comics :During World War II, The...
published the result of a poll within the Flemish population. According to these results 60% of the Flemish did not desire an independent Flemish state and 26% were willing to support a partition. A similar poll taken on September 25, 2010 by La Libre Belgique
La Libre Belgique
La Libre Belgique is a Belgian newspaper in French. In Belgium, it can be roughly seen as an equivalent of Flemish De Standaard. The paper is widely perceived as pro-catholic...
showed that 40% of the Belgians were willing to return to a unitary Belgium (as the country was before the state reform
State reform in Belgium
The term State reform in the Belgian context indicates a process towards finding constitutional and legal solutions for the problems and tensions between the different segments of the Belgian population, mostly Dutch-speakers of Flanders and French-speakers of Wallonia...
of the 1970s). This percentage is to be compared with the 12% of the Belgians wanting a partition of the country and the 32% who desired a further federalization. The poll also showed that a unitary Belgian state was supported by 22% of the Flemish, 50% of the Brusselers and 51% of the Walloons, and that 16% of the Flemish wished a split of Belgium. It is interesting to compare this with the 40.8% of Flemings who voted for a party advocating Flemish independence during the 2010 election. In any case, the vast majority of the Belgians want a change: only 8% agree with the current Belgian federal system. The Belgians who participated in this poll were also asked which scenario they would prefer in case a partition of Belgium did occur. An independent Flanders together with a union of Brussels and Wallonia was supported by 35% of the Belgians. The creation of three small states (Flanders, Brussels and Wallonia) was preferred by 23%, a union between France and Wallonia was supported by 14%, and a union between Flanders and Brussels together with an independent Wallonia by 12%. In Flanders, 27% supported a three-state scenario and 26% supported a union between Flanders and Brussels. Those who had no preferred scenario numbered 25%. The majority of the Walloons (53%) agreed with a union between Brussels and Wallonia while a minority (21%) supported a merge with France. Only 10% of the Walloons prefer an independent Walloon state. In contrast, the Brusselers were divided between a union with Wallonia (39%) and a city-state scenario (34%).
On October 4, 2010, Bart De Wever
Bart De Wever
Bart Albert Liliane De Wever is a Belgian politician and since 2004 has been the president of the New Flemish Alliance , a Flemish party that strives for an independent Flanders in a united Europe. He has also been a member of the Flemish parliament since 2004...
(N-VA) departed from the negotiations. His exit put Elio Di Rupo
Elio Di Rupo
Elio Di Rupo is a Belgian social-democratic politician and the Party Leader of the Socialist Party .-Biography:...
's Plan B for Belgium, i.e. a partition of Belgium along the borderline of the French Community, under a new light and many, particularly in the French-speaking part of the country, started to speak openly about its concrete realization. Plan B is the continuation of Belgium with Brussels and Wallonia only and the departure of Flanders from the Belgian federation. On October 10, Elio Di Rupo stated on television what his plan was: first, asking the Flemish population whether it was willing to secede; second, asking the population in Brussels and Wallonia whether they intended to remain united within Belgium. He also stressed that in either case citizens living in municipalities with linguistic facilities should also be asked. He however underlined that he did not desire such an extreme response but that this scenario should not be ignored. Di Rupo's declarations on television have been broadly discussed in the French-written press: according to Le Soir, the country had never been so close to a split than this day; less alarmist La Libre Belgique
La Libre Belgique
La Libre Belgique is a Belgian newspaper in French. In Belgium, it can be roughly seen as an equivalent of Flemish De Standaard. The paper is widely perceived as pro-catholic...
observed that the negotiations are deadlocked and considered Di Rupo's move a good way to define the point that the Francophones are not ready to negotiate further. However La Dernière Heure
La Dernière Heure
La Dernière Heure and "Les Sports" is a French general daily newspaper in Belgium....
, Vers l'Avenir and Flemish columnists in De Morgen
De Morgen
De Morgen is a Flemish newspaper with a circulation of 53,860. It originates from a merger in 1978 of two socialist newspapers Vooruit and Volksgazet ....
, Het Laatste Nieuws
Het Laatste Nieuws
Het Laatste Nieuws is a Dutch language newspaper based in Brussels, Belgium. It was founded by Julius Hoste Sr. on 7 June 1888. It is now part of De Persgroep, and has a circulation of 292,410 copies, making it the most popular newspaper in Flanders and Belgium.- Comics :During World War II, The...
and De Standaard
De Standaard
De Standaard is a Flemish daily newspaper published in Belgium by Corelio . Circulation was about 102.280 in 2007. It was traditionally a Christian-Democratic paper, associated with the Christian-Democratic and Flemish Party, and in opposition to the Socialist Flemish daily De Morgen...
condensed Di Rupo's Plan B down to a tactical move in order to put the pressure on the negotiations and redefine the relations between PS and MR. The Plan B proposed by Di Rupo was developed by Christian Berhendt, a specialist of constitutional law at the University of Liège
University of Liège
The University of Liège , in Liège, Wallonia, Belgium, is a major public university in the French Community of Belgium. Its official language is French.-History:...
. According to Berhendt, a hypothetical partition of Belgium is constrained by the fact that no political party is ready to split Belgium at the cost of separating from the numerous international organizations to which Belgium is affiliated. These constraints are such that a splitting of the country would require the modification and ratification of a huge number of treaties. The interpenetration of the Belgian entities is so complicated that, in comparison, the peaceful split of Czechoslovakia
Dissolution of Czechoslovakia
The dissolution of Czechoslovakia, which took effect on 1 January 1993, was an event that saw the self-determined separation of the federal state of Czechoslovakia. The Czech Republic and Slovakia, entities which had arisen in 1969 within the framework of Czechoslovak federalisation, became...
appears quite simple. According to Berhendt several scenarios are therefore impossible: a unilateral secession of Flanders would be rejected by countries fearing secession of their own minorities, such as China, Russia or Spain, because this would create a precedent they cannot allow; the creation of an autonomous European district in Brussels is not a realistic perspective because the European Union, as it is now, is not able to administrate such a large city; a scenario where Flanders and Brussels would form a union is not possible either because, according to Berhendt, the French-speakers will never agree on such a treaty. For Marc Verdussen (Université Catholique de Louvain
Université catholique de Louvain
The Université catholique de Louvain, sometimes known, especially in Belgium, as UCL, is Belgium's largest French-speaking university. It is located in Louvain-la-Neuve and in Brussels...
), two doorways are open: Plan B1, Belgium dissolves into two entities Flanders on the one hand and a new Wallonia-Brussels state on the other; and Plan B2, Flanders secedes and a residual Belgian state continues with Brussels and Wallonia. Though it is clear that Plan B2 is favorable to the Francophones, it is not evident that it would be accepted by the Flemings and by a hypothetical international tribunal. According to the Gewif (Groupe d'études pour la Wallonie intégrée à la France), Di Rupo's Plan B is not realisable because the new Brussels-Wallonia would inherit an unbearable debt. The Gewif therefore argued that only a union with France would be possible. On September 13 Le Soir
Le Soir
Le Soir is a Berliner Format Belgian newspaper. Le Soir was founded in 1887 by Emile Rossel. It is the most popular Francophone newspaper in Belgium, and considered a newspaper of record.-Editorial stance:...
published a five-pages article on the possible consequences. According to this analysis, the largest burden on the shoulders of the new Brussels-Wallonian state would be unemployment (17% of the workers; to be compared to 8% in Flanders) and state debt (150 Billions Euros, i.e. 106% of GDP). However Le Soir's columnists observed that the new state would have a huge GDP per capita (31,000 €) and would rank 7th among the 27 EU states. Nevertheless this would be only due to the inclusion of Brussels where the GDP per capita numbers more than 60,000 €.
External links
- Belgique, vers la fracture? (ARTE, French)
- Zerbricht Belgien? (ARTE, German)
- Belgium, from Model to Case Study for Conflict Resolution, report published on 2011-02-01 by the United States Institute of PeaceUnited States Institute of PeaceThe United States Institute of Peace was created by Congress as a non-partisan, federal institution that works to prevent or end violent conflict around the world...
. - La Flandre, 28e membre de l'UE? by Jean-Sébastien Lefebvre on Slate.frSlate (magazine)Slate is a US-based English language online current affairs and culture magazine created in 1996 by former New Republic editor Michael Kinsley, initially under the ownership of Microsoft as part of MSN. On 21 December 2004 it was purchased by the Washington Post Company...
(in French). - Time to call it a day : Sometimes it is right for a country to recognise that its job is done, The EconomistThe EconomistThe Economist is an English-language weekly news and international affairs publication owned by The Economist Newspaper Ltd. and edited in offices in the City of Westminster, London, England. Continuous publication began under founder James Wilson in September 1843...
, September 6th 2007 - The trouble with Flanders : Why Belgium’s unending linguistic disputes matter to Europe, The EconomistThe EconomistThe Economist is an English-language weekly news and international affairs publication owned by The Economist Newspaper Ltd. and edited in offices in the City of Westminster, London, England. Continuous publication began under founder James Wilson in September 1843...
, January 27th 2011