Crisis of Unity in Belgium

Belgium is a small country of about 10 million and roughly the size of Maryland. Though they may not have a large population, everything else about the country is huge. Belgium both produces and consumes huge amounts of alcohol, punching way above their weight in beer terms. Belgians are crazy about their football, with the top division having several teams pulling in over 20,000 fans a game, an impressive feat for such a small country. Politically, Belgium has more intensity, partisanship, inter-party strife, and drama than many of their larger neighbors. To understand the nature of Belgian politics and society, it helps to know a bit of background.

Belgium is a country with three separate language groups, there being a French-speaking community (Wallonia), a Dutch-speaking community (Flanders), and a small German-speaking community, a product of the Treaty of Versailles at the end of World War One. Brussels, the capital, is officially bilingual and a separate governing entity in the country, as it houses not only the Belgian government, but also the European Union Parliament and other EU buildings. Belgium has experienced successive waves of increasing federalization of the country, making both Wallonia and Flanders more and more autonomous, catering to the growing divide and political strife on linguistic and cultural lines that has marked the country's internal policies for over a century.

In 1830, Belgium was part of the United Kingdom of the Netherlands, who had dominated the largely Catholic and French-speaking Walloons, resulting in feelings of oppression. The Southern provinces, as Belgium was called then, were underrepresented in the Dutch government, and the use of the French language, spoken in Wallonia and among the upper-class of Flemish, was repressed to the benefit of the Dutch. Influenced by the July Revolution in France, French-speaking Catholics revolted against Dutch authority on August 25, 1830, in Brussels. The Dutch were unable to quell the riots, and Belgium gained its independence.

However, the independence of Belgium really only benefited the French-speaking aristocracy of Flanders and Wallonia. Flemish, the variant of Dutch spoken by a majority of Belgians, was repressed and not given official recognition until some 130 years later, in the 1960's. Economic and political policies vastly favored francophones over Dutch-speakers, with the Wallonia becoming rich at the expense of Flanders. Add to this the fact that Brussels, for centuries a majority-Dutch city, was slowly Frenchified, as more and more of the population began speaking French, leading to its current status as being a francophone enclave within Dutch-speaking Flanders. The resulting rise in Flemish nationalism and desire for autonomy is understandable, then.

Fast-forward to the current day, and the huge impact the effects of federalization and granting increasing autonomy to both Wallonia and Flanders can be seen. Belgium is now a country in name only, really. The Dutch Community (Flanders) and the French Community (Wallonia) are almost completely sovereign countries. They have autonomous laws, government, and policies except in foreign affairs, justice, social security, and monetary issues. The two language groups watch different TV, film, read different books, newspapers, and media, listen to different music, and have different societal figures that the other know nothing about. Going from one place to another may be easy, considering one can get from any point in the country to another in under an hour, but it is like going from one country to a completely different one. Economically, Flanders is seen as being more industrial and richer, having to spend their own money to prop up the more agricultural, poorer Wallonia. Throw in resentment among the 6 million Flemish who are aggrieved at being forced to speak the language of the 4 million Wallonians, which is significantly more important internationally, especially given the proximity to France, as well as immigrants coming to Belgium who live in Flanders but only learn French, and the scene is set for chaos and disunity.

There are no national parties in Belgium. There are a myriad of local (language-centered) parties, ranging from center-right or center-left, to socialist and green, to nationalist, sovereigntist parties calling for full independence of their respective areas. In 2008, the Belgian government that had only been in power for 4 months collapsed. The government had taken over 200 days to come to an agreement for a coalition government, which ended up being a mish-mash of 6 different parties, three each from Wallonia and Flanders. When Prime Minister Yves Leterme offered his resignation to King Albert II on July 15, 2008, the King refused.

Yves Leterme

The political deadlock and uncertainty over such a lengthy period led many to wonder if Belgium would be able to survive as a single entity in Europe. After the governmental debacle of 2007-2008, similar circumstances among the linguistic groups of Belgium again caused an early election this year, to be held on June 13. What stands out about this, is that recent polls show that separatist parties in Flanders are hovering near majority percentages. What would happen if pro-independence parties gain a majority in the Belgian government?

A major question would be what to do with Brussels, which would be an enclave within an independent Flanders with a majority of French-speakers and containing federal buildings of the Belgian government, as well as the European Parliament. Should Flanders democratically separate, no doubt certain parts of the country would be happy, but the constitutional and logistical matter of it all would seem to be the recipe for a political headache. Though separatism may have 50% of the vote in Flanders, that still only means that 30% of Belgium as a whole would agree to seeing the North go through with it. Would other countries recognize this newly-independent Flanders, or would it become a type of Balkanization or Kosovo-ization?

In the past, when faced with such a crisis of national identity and unity, Belgium has been able to work out compromise after compromise to preserve the stability of the country. It is likely that, should compromise fail in the coming elections, the many logistical, constitutional, and political obstacles standing in the way of full sovereignty for Flanders would at worst impede, hinder, or slow the process, and at best block it altogether, making the prospect of seeing a divided Belgium in the coming months very unlikely.

Though Belgium will probably not be breaking up anytime soon, the possibility is still alive and kicking, and questions remain as to how the country can move on from separatism and come to a lasting state of affairs in which both of Belgium's major linguistic regions are satisfied.