The Contemporary Significance of Historical Legacies in Belgium

Since 1993, Belgium is officially a federal state, composed of – three – communities and – three – regions, as the – new at the time – first article of the Constitution proclaims. The history of federalism in Belgium is therefore quite recent. Nevertheless, the story is – much – longer since it starts with the independence of Belgium from the United Kingdom of the Netherlands in 1830. The very beginning of a state and the underlying causes of its creation, as well as its place on the map, the timing of its creation and the characteristics of the elites who take the lead and define the new state’s nature are of crucial importance and these elements shape the country’s political development for centuries. Nonetheless, although the beginning of any state sets up a path dependency, there are also critical junctures along its political development which in turn influences the course of history. This is especially true for Belgium. Here, history and politics are intrinsically interrelated. Indeed, these dual dynamics – history as politics and politics as history – are at the heart of Belgium’s federalism.
To explore these dynamics, this paper distinguishes three key variables of the historical-political relationship in order to apprehend the contemporary significance of historical legacies in Belgium. The first variable is the territorial principle vs. linguistic principle debate, which constitutes the backbone of the so-called Belgian community question – or in other words the foremost divisive issue of federalism in Belgium. The second variable is the political parties because they have played and play the major role in Belgian politics and therefore in the Belgian federal dynamics. The third variable is made of the people; that is, at the individual level, the inhabitants or the citizens or the voters and, at the collective level, the communities and/or the nations of Belgium. These three variables are at the heart of Belgium’s past, present and future and continuously interact with one another – i.e. they form a triangle of interactions. In order to offer a clear picture of these interactions, Belgium’s history is divided into three periods: before federalism (1830-1960), federalism (1960-2010) and after federalism (2010-onwards). This division in three variables and in three periods structures the paper.