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Belgium, country of northwestern Europe. It is one of the smallest and most densely populated European countries, and it has been, since its independence in 1830, a representative democracy headed by a hereditary constitutional monarch. Initially, Belgium had a unitary form of government. In the 1980s and ’90s, however, steps were taken to turn Belgium into a federal state with powers shared among the regions of Flanders, Wallonia, and the Brussels-Capital Region.
Culturally, Belgium is a heterogeneous country straddling the border between the Romance and Germanic language families of western Europe. With the exception of a small German-speaking population in the eastern part of the country, Belgium is divided between a French-speaking people, collectively called Walloons (approximately one-third of the total population), who are concentrated in the five southern provinces (Hainaut, Namur, Liège, Walloon Brabant, and Luxembourg), and Flemings, a Flemish- (Dutch-) speaking people (more than one-half of the total population), who are concentrated in the five northern and northeastern provinces (West Flanders, East Flanders [West-Vlaanderen, Oost-Vlaanderen], Flemish Brabant, Antwerp, and Limburg). Just north of the boundary between Walloon Brabant (Brabant Walloon) and Flemish (Vlaams) Brabant lies the officially bilingual but majority French-speaking Brussels-Capital Region, with approximately one-tenth of the total population. (See also Fleming and Walloon.)
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Belgium and the political entities that preceded it have been rich with historical and cultural associations, from the Gothic grandeur of its medieval university and commercial cities and its small, castle-dominated towns on steep-bluffed winding rivers, through its broad traditions in painting and music that marked one of the high points of the northern Renaissance in the 16th century, to its contributions to the arts of the 20th century and its maintenance of the folk cultures of past eras. The Belgian landscape has been a major European battleground for centuries, notably in modern times during the Battle of Waterloo (1815) and the 20th century’s two world wars. Given its area and population, Belgium today is one of the most heavily industrialized and urbanized countries in Europe. It is a member of the Benelux Economic Union (with the Netherlands and Luxembourg), the European Union (EU), and the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO)—organizations that all have headquarters in or near the capital city of Brussels.
Land
The country has a total of 860 miles (1,385 km) of land boundaries with neighbours; it is bounded by the Netherlands to the north, Germany to the east, Luxembourg to the southeast, and France to the south. Belgium also has some 40 miles (60 km) of shoreline on the North Sea. Britannica QuizGuess the Country by Its Neighbors Quiz
Relief, drainage, and soils
Belgium generally is a low-lying country, with a broad coastal plain extending in a southeasterly direction from the North Sea and the Netherlands and rising gradually into the Ardennes hills and forests of the southeast, where a maximum elevation of 2,277 feet (694 metres) is reached at Botrange.
The main physical regions are the Ardennes and the Ardennes foothills; Côtes Lorraines (Belgian Lorraine), the intrusion of the Paris Basin in the south; and the Anglo-Belgian Basin in the north, comprising the Central Plateaus, the plain of Flanders, and the Kempenland (French: Campine).
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The Ardennes region is part of the Hercynian orogenic belt of mountain ranges, which reaches from western Ireland into Germany and was formed roughly 300 to 400 million years ago, during the Paleozoic Era. The Ardennes is a plateau cut deeply by the Meuse River and its tributaries. Its higher points contain peat bogs and have poor drainage; these uplands are unsuitable as cropland.
A large depression, known east of the Meuse River as the Famenne and west of it as the Fagne, separates the Ardennes from the geologically and topographically complex foothills to the north. The principal feature of the area is the Condroz, a plateau more than 1,100 feet (335 metres) in elevation comprising a succession of valleys hollowed out of the limestone between sandstone crests. Its northern boundary is the Sambre-Meuse valley, which traverses Belgium from south-southwest to northeast.
Situated south of the Ardennes and cut off from the rest of the country, Côtes Lorraines is a series of hills with north-facing scarps. About half of it remains wooded; in the south lies a small region of iron ore deposits.
A region of sand and clay soils lying between 150 and 650 feet (45 and 200 metres) in elevation, the Central Plateaus cover northern Hainaut, Walloon Brabant, southern Flemish Brabant, and the Hesbaye plateau region of Liège. The area is dissected by the Dender, Senne, Dijle, and other rivers that enter the Schelde (Escaut) River; it is bounded to the east by the Herve Plateau. The Brussels region lies within the Central Plateaus.
Bordering the North Sea from France to the Schelde is the low-lying plain of Flanders, which has two main sections. Maritime Flanders, extending inland for about 5 to 10 miles (8 to 16 km), is a region of newly formed and reclaimed land (polders) protected by a line of dunes and dikes and having largely clay soils. Interior Flanders comprises most of East and West Flanders and has sand-silt or sand soils. At an elevation of about 80 to 300 feet (25 to 90 metres), it is drained by the Leie, Schelde, and Dender rivers flowing northeastward to the Schelde estuary. Several shipping canals interlace the landscape and connect the river systems. Lying between about 160 and 330 feet (50 and 100 metres) in elevation, the Kempenland contains pastureland and is the site of a number of industrial enterprises; it forms an irregular watershed of plateau and plain between the extensive Schelde and Meuse drainage systems.
Climate of Belgium
Belgium has a temperate, maritime climate predominantly influenced by air masses from the Atlantic. Rapid and frequent alternation of different air masses separated by fronts gives Belgium considerable variability in weather. Frontal conditions moving from the west produce heavy and frequent rainfall, averaging 30 to 40 inches (750 to 1,000 mm) a year. Winters are damp and cool with frequent fogs; summers are rather mild. The annual mean temperature is around 50 °F (10 °C). Brussels, which is roughly in the middle of the country, has a mean minimum temperature of just below 32 °F (0 °C) in January and a mean maximum of about 71 °F (22 °C) in July.
Regional climatic differences are determined by elevation and distance inland. Farther inland, maritime influences become weaker, and the climate becomes more continental, characterized by greater seasonal extremes of temperature. The Ardennes region, the highest and farthest inland, is the coldest. In winter, frost occurs on about 120 days, snow falls on 30 to 35 days, and January mean minimum temperatures are lower than elsewhere. In summer, the elevation counteracts the effect of distance inland, and July mean maximum temperatures are the lowest in the country. Because of the topography, the region has the highest rainfall in Belgium. In contrast, the Flanders region enjoys generally higher temperatures throughout the year. There are fewer than 60 days of frost and fewer than 15 of snow. On the seacoast these figures are reduced to below 50 and 10, respectively. There are a few hot days, especially on the coast, where the annual rainfall is the lowest in the country.
Plant and animal life
All of Belgium except the Ardennes lies within the zone of broad-leaved deciduous forestation. The dominant tree is the oak; others include beeches, birches, and elms. Little remains of the forest that covered this area 2,000 years ago. Most of lowland Belgium is now used for agriculture or human settlement; small clumps of deciduous trees and grasses dominate the remaining open spaces. In the Kempenland, however, significant areas are devoted to planted forests of silver birch and Corsican pine.
The Ardennes lies within the zone of mixed deciduous and coniferous forestation. The area has been heavily logged for centuries. Hence, little old-growth forest remains. The Ardennes is dominated now by coniferous forests in the higher elevations and by zones of mixed coniferous and deciduous trees, especially beeches and oaks, in the foothills. Hautes Fagnes, which is located at the northeastern edge of the Ardennes, has many peat bogs. Drainage has improved, however, and the area, forested with spruce, is part of a nature reserve.
Forest and grassland dominate the landscape south of the Sambre-Meuse valley. Meadows, with a few orchards, occur near the Fagne depression and in the Herve Plateau, whereas forest occupies a significant portion of the land along both edges of the Ardennes and in the heart of Côtes Lorraines.
The animal population, greatly reduced by human activities, is Eurasian. Most remaining wild animals are found in the Ardennes; wild boars, wildcats, deer, and pheasant are among the more common animals of the region. A number of birds can be found in the Belgian lowlands, including sandpipers, woodcocks, snipes, and lapwings. The Anglo-Belgian Basin north of the Ardennes is home to a considerable population of muskrats and hamsters.
People
Ethnic groups and languages
The population of Belgium is divided into three linguistic communities. In the north the Flemings, who constitute more than half of Belgium’s population, speak Flemish, which is equivalent to Dutch (sometimes called Netherlandic). In the south the French-speaking Walloons make up about one-third of the country’s population. About one-tenth of the people are completely bilingual, but a majority have some knowledge of both French and Flemish. The German-language region in eastern Liège province, containing a small fraction of the Belgian population, consists of several communes around Eupen and Saint-Vith (Sankt-Vith) (see Eupen-et-Malmédy). The city of Brussels comprises a number of officially bilingual communes, although the metropolitan area extends far into the surrounding Flemish and Walloon communes. The French-speaking population is by far the larger in the capital region. Bruxellois, a regionally distinct dialect influenced by both French and Flemish is also spoken by a small segment of the city’s inhabitants.
ethnic and linguistic composition of Belgium
The ethnic and linguistic composition of Belgium.
During the 19th and early 20th centuries, Belgium’s managerial, professional, and administrative ranks were filled almost entirely by the French-speaking segment of the population, even in Flanders. The Flemings long protested what they felt was the exclusion of the average nonbilingual Fleming from effective participation in everyday dealings concerning law, medicine, government administration, and industrial employment. The Flemings, after gradually gaining greater numerical and political strength, eventually forced reforms that established Flanders as a unilingual Flemish-speaking area, provided Flemings with access to political and economic power, and established a degree of regional autonomy. Many disputes and much rancour remain between Flemish- and French-speaking Belgians, however.
Foreign-born residents make up less than one-tenth of the population. Citizens of the EU constitute much of the foreign-born population, but there is also a large number of immigrants from other parts of the world—particularly North and Central Africa, the Middle East, and Southwest Asia.
Religion
The majority of Belgians are Roman Catholic, but regular attendance at religious services is variable. Although it is marked in the Flemish region and the Ardennes, regular attendance at church has decreased in the Walloon industrial region and in Brussels, and nearly one-third of Belgians are nonreligious. The relatively few Protestants live mostly in urban areas in Hainaut, particularly in the industrial region known as the Borinage, and in and around Brussels. Several municipalities on the north and west sides of Brussels—notably Schaerbeek—are home to many Muslim immigrants. The country’s small Jewish population is concentrated in and around Brussels and Antwerp. Britannica QuizWhich Country Is Larger By Population? Quiz
Settlement patterns
The ecological resources of the several natural regions and the consequent variations in land use have been major factors in determining patterns of rural settlement. The nature of the urban developments is derived mainly from the patterns of mining, manufacturing, commerce, and related enterprises throughout the country.
The population is sparse in the Ardennes region in the south, the Herve Plateau in the east, and the western Entre-Sambre-et-Meuse region in the southwest. The open landscape of maritime Flanders and the lower Schelde, intersected by dikes and canals, is dotted with farms and residential areas. Interior Flanders is a region of scattered habitation and market towns. However, Belgium is one of the world’s most heavily urbanized countries, and the vast majority of its inhabitants live in cities.
In the Walloon coalfields—roughly in and to the north of the Meuse valley across south-central Belgium—coal mining, glass manufacturing, iron production, zinc metallurgy, and the chemical and electrical industries in the 19th and 20th centuries gave rise to a number of large cities with widely varying characteristics. Liège (Flemish: Luik) has been the regional economic and cultural capital since the Middle Ages. Namur (Flemish: Namen), an ancient city that expanded significantly with industrialization, is the capital of the administrative region of Wallonia. Charleroi, the heart of a large urban industrial area, is a newer city dominated by commerce and industry. La Louvière, founded during the 19th-century industrial development, is a burgeoning metropolitan centre. The Borinage, an area of high population density without a central city, comes under the influence of the city of Mons (Flemish: Bergen).
In Flanders the ancient city of Antwerp (Flemish: Antwerpen; French: Anvers) and its metropolitan area, the second largest in the country, extend along the east bank of the Schelde. The city’s port, one of the largest in Europe, is formed by the base of the estuary and the concave riverbank. The existence of the port has favoured the establishment of important and diverse industries: petroleum refining, chemical and metallurgical industries, food processing, and electronics manufacturing. The city is also well known for its diamond-cutting industry.
Ghent (Flemish: Gent; French: Gand), a historic university town, is another of Belgium’s important ports. Long a centre of the textile industry, Ghent in the 20th century experienced an industrial regeneration characterized especially by steel production along the Ghent-Terneuzen Canal, connecting the port to the Schelde.
Stone bridge over a canal, Brugge, Belgium.
A third busy port, Zeebrugge (French: Bruges-sur-mer), is connected by canal to the inland city of Brugge (French: Bruges), meaning “bridge.” Brugge is a city of medieval aspect, resplendent with cathedrals, late medieval public buildings, and ancient homes. As its name implies, the city has many bridges spanning the several canals and the canalized Reie River. Mentioned as early as the 7th century, Brugge became an important trading centre for the Hanseatic League and reached its zenith during the 15th century, when the dukes of Burgundy held court there.
Louvain (Flemish: Leuven), about 16 miles (26 km) east of Brussels, is the site of the Catholic University of Louvain (founded 1425), the first university to be established in the Low Countries. The institution was damaged severely during both world wars, but it was rebuilt, and many countries, the United States in particular, helped it to restock its libraries.
Belgium’s largest city, Brussels (Flemish: Brussel; French: Bruxelles), the capital of both the country and the administrative region of Flanders, has suburbs that spread into Walloon Brabant and Flemish Brabant. It is the centre of commerce, industry, and intellectual life in Belgium. It is also a city of international importance. The headquarters of the EU and NATO are located in Brussels, infusing the city with a very multicultural and cosmopolitan air. It is home to embassies and consulates of most of the world’s countries, offices housing delegations from most of Europe’s major substate regions (e.g., Catalonia and Bavaria), and more than 1,000 nongovernmental organizations associated with the United Nations. Many of the inhabitants of Brussels distance themselves from the debates between Flemish and French speakers and see themselves as living in a distinct cultural region.
Demographic trends
The annual growth rate of the Belgian population is very low; overall birth rates and immigration exceed death rates and emigration only slightly. Population growth rates, which were markedly higher in Flanders than in Wallonia prior to the 1980s, became nearly equivalent by the end of the 20th century. There was considerable rural-to-urban migration throughout the 20th century. The institution of policies that made Wallonia and Flanders officially unilingual regions greatly reduced migration between those two regions, but there is considerable migration within language regions. The emigration rate is low. Most of those who emigrate go to other EU countries or to the United States.
Since World War II the foreign-born population has increased at a rate higher than that of Belgian nationals, owing to continued immigration and a higher birth rate among immigrants. The largest concentrations of foreigners are found in the cities of the Walloon mining and industrial areas, in Brussels, and in Antwerp. Foreign workers are largely of Mediterranean origin (mostly Italian, Middle Eastern, and North African). A modest number of these guest workers return to their countries of origin each year.
Economy of Belgium
Belgium has a free-enterprise economy, with the majority of the gross domestic product (GDP) generated by the service sector. The Belgian economy also is inextricably tied to that of Europe. The country has been a member of a variety of supranational organizations, including the Belgium-Luxembourg Economic Union (BLEU), the Benelux Economic Union, and the EU. The first major step Belgium took in internationalizing its economy occurred when it became a charter member of the European Coal and Steel Community in 1952. On January 1, 1999, Belgium also became a charter member of the European Monetary Union, paving the way for the introduction of the euro, which became the country’s sole currency in 2002, replacing the Belgian franc.
Historically, Belgium’s national prosperity was mainly dependent on the country’s role as a fabricator and processor of imported raw materials and on the subsequent export of finished goods. The country became a major steel producer in the early 19th century, with factories centred in the southern Walloon coal-mining region, particularly in the Sambre-Meuse valley. Rigorous monetary reform aided Belgium’s post-World War II recovery and expansion, particularly of the Flemish light manufacturing and chemical industries that developed rapidly in the north, and Belgium became one of the first European countries to reestablish a favourable balance of trade in the postwar world. By the late 20th century, however, coal reserves in Wallonia were exhausted, the aging steel industry had become inefficient, labour costs had risen dramatically, and foreign investment (a major portion of the country’s industrial assets are controlled by multinational companies) had declined.
The government, in an effort to reverse the near-depression levels of industrial output that had developed, subsidized ailing industries, particularly steel and textiles, and offered tax incentives, reduced interest rates, and capital bonuses to attract foreign investment. These efforts were moderately successful, but they left Belgium with one of the largest budget deficits in relation to gross national product in Europe. The government was forced to borrow heavily from abroad to finance foreign trade (i.e., importing of foreign goods) and to sustain its generous social welfare system. In the early 1980s the government attempted to reduce the budget deficit; the debt-to-GDP ratio decreased as tighter monetary and fiscal policies were implemented by the central bank. Moreover, in the early 1990s the government decreased its subsidy to the social security system. By the early 21st century, Belgium had diversified its sources of social-security funding and succeeded in balancing its budget. Regionally, Flanders has attracted a disproportionate share of investment, but the national government has offered subsidies and incentives to encourage investment within Wallonia. Unemployment also has been less of a problem in Flanders, which has experienced significant growth in service industries, than in Wallonia, where the negative consequences of deindustrialization remain.
Agriculture, forestry, and fishing
Only a small percentage of the country’s active population engages in agriculture, and agricultural activity has continued to shrink, both in employment and in its contribution to the GDP. About one-fourth of Belgium’s land area is agricultural and under permanent cultivation; more than one-fifth comprises meadows and pastures. Major crops are sugar beets, chicory, flax, cereal grains, and potatoes. The cultivation of fruits, vegetables, and ornamental plants also is important, particularly in Flanders. However, agricultural activity in Belgium centres primarily on livestock; dairy and meat products constitute more than two-thirds of the total farm value.
Forage crops, barley, oats, potatoes, and even wheat are grown everywhere, but especially in the southeast. The region is one of striking contrasts: in the Condroz farms range in size from 75 to 250 acres (30 to 100 hectares), whereas in the Ardennes they are between 25 and 75 acres (10 to 30 hectares).
The open countryside of north-central Belgium—Hainaut, Flemish Brabant, Walloon Brabant, and Hesbaye (the region of rolling land southwest of Limburg)—includes pastureland as well as intensive diversified cultivation of such crops as wheat, sugar beets, and oats; local variations include orchards in northern Hesbaye. Farms, with their closed courts, range in size from 75 to 250 acres (30 to 100 hectares).
Most farms in the far north—maritime Flanders and the lower Schelde—range in size from 25 to 75 acres (10 to 30 hectares), some of which are under pasture, while the remainder are cultivated, with wheat and sugar beets again the dominant crops. Interior Flanders is devoted to grazing. Intensive cultivation is confined to gardens and small farms, which are usually smaller than 10 acres (4 hectares). Oats, rye, and potatoes are the chief crops; wheat, sugar beets, chicory, hops, flax, and ornamental plants (e.g., azaleas, roses, and begonias) also are grown in southwestern Flanders.
The planted forests of the Ardennes and the Kempenland support Belgium’s relatively small forest-products industry. Growth of the forest industry after World War II has been aided by mechanization, allowing Belgium to reduce its reliance on imported timber.
Belgium’s fishing industry is relatively small; almost all fish are consumed within the country. Zeebrugge and Ostend, the main fishing ports, send a modest fleet of trawlers to the North Sea fishing grounds. The harvesting of mussels is also an important industry in Belgium, with the mollusks being a popular menu item in restaurants throughout the country.
Resources and power
Historically, coal was Belgium’s most important mineral resource. There were two major coal-mining areas. The coal in the Sambre-Meuse valley occurred in a narrow band across south-central Belgium from the French border through Mons, Charleroi, Namur, and Liège. Mined since the 13th century, these coal reserves were instrumental in Belgium’s industrialization during the 19th century. By the 1960s the easily extractable coal reserves were exhausted, and most of the region’s mines were closed. By 1992 mining had ceased there and in the country’s other major coal-mining area, in the Kempenland (Limburg province) in northeastern Belgium. Belgium now imports all its coal, which is needed for the steel industry and for domestic heating.
During the 19th century, iron ore and zinc deposits in the Sambre-Meuse valley were heavily exploited. They too are now exhausted, but the refining of imported metallic ores remains an important component of Belgium’s economy. Chalk and limestone mining around Tournai, Mons, and Liège, which supports a significant cement industry, is of greater contemporary importance. In addition, sands from the Kempenland supply the glass-manufacturing industry, and clays from the Borinage are used for pottery products and bricks. Stones, principally specialty marbles, also are quarried.
Belgium’s water resources are concentrated in the southern part of the country. Most streams rise in the Ardennes and flow northward; three-fourths of the country’s groundwater originates in the south. Since the largest concentration of population is in the north, there is a marked regional disjunction between water supply and demand. This problem is addressed through elaborate water-transfer systems involving canals, storage basins, and pipelines. Although reasonably plentiful, existing water supplies incur heavy demands from industrial and domestic consumers. Moreover, water pollution is a serious problem. In the south a modest hydroelectric power industry has developed along fast-moving streams. However, as nuclear reactors generate more than half of Belgium’s electricity, the use of water for cooling in nuclear power stations is much more significant. With the expansion of domestic and commercial needs in the late 20th and early 21st centuries, increasing attention focused on problems of water quality and supply.
Manufacturing
The manufacturing sector accounts for about one-sixth of the GDP. Manufacturing is the major economic activity in the provinces of East Flanders, Limburg, and Hainaut. The corridor between Antwerp and Brussels also has emerged as a major manufacturing zone, eclipsing the older industrial concentration in the Sambre-Meuse valley.
Metallurgy, steel, textiles, chemicals, glass, paper, and food processing are the dominant industries. Belgium is one of the world’s leading processors of cobalt, radium, copper, zinc, and lead. Refineries, located principally in the Antwerp area, process crude petroleum. Antwerp is also known for diamond cutting and dealing. The lace made in Belgium has been internationally renowned for centuries. To combat the slow decline of this industry, which has been dependent on the handiwork of an aging population of skilled women, specialized schools were established in Mons and Binche to train younger workers.
Foreign investment led to considerable growth in the engineering sector of Belgium’s economy in the late 20th century. The country has assembly plants for foreign automakers, as well as for foreign firms manufacturing heavy electrical goods. Moreover, Belgium has a number of important manufacturers of machine tools and specialized plastics.
Finance of Belgium
The economic importance of the financial sector has increased significantly since the 1960s. Numerous Belgian and foreign banks operate in the country, particularly in Brussels. The National Bank, the central bank of Belgium, works to ensure national financial security, issues currency, and provides financial services to the federal government, the financial sector, and the public. The European Central Bank is now responsible for the formulation of key aspects of monetary policy. An important stock exchange was founded in Brussels in the early 19th century. In 2000 it merged with the Amsterdam and Paris stock exchanges to form Euronext—the first fully integrated cross-border equities market. Belgium has long been a target of significant foreign investment. Foreign investments in the energy, finance, and business-support sectors are of particular significance in 21st-century Belgium.
Trade
Among Belgium’s main imports are raw materials (including petroleum), motor vehicles, chemicals, textiles, and food products. Major exports include motor vehicles, chemicals and pharmaceutical products, machinery, plastics, diamonds, food and livestock, textile products, and iron and steel.
Belgium’s principal trade partners are the member countries of the EU, particularly Germany, France, the Netherlands, and the United Kingdom.
Services
Spurred by the expanding needs of international business and government as well as the growth of tourism, especially in western Flanders and the Ardennes, the service sector grew tremendously in the second half of the 20th century. Flanders in particular enjoyed an economic boom because of the growth of service industries. Today the overwhelming majority of the Belgian labour force is employed in private and public services.
Labour and taxation
After the service industries, manufacturing and construction enterprises are the largest employers. Agriculture and mining employ only a tiny percentage of the labour force. About half of Belgian workers belong to labour unions.
The Belgian government levies taxes on income as well as on goods and services. These taxes, along with social security contributions, provide the bulk of the national revenue. Regions and local units of government also may levy taxes.
Transportation and telecommunications
Belgium has an extensive system of main roads, supplemented by modern expressways that extend from Brussels to Ostend by way of Ghent and Brugge, from Brussels to Antwerp, from Brussels to Luxembourg city by way of Namur, and from Antwerp to Aachen (Germany) by way of Hasselt and Liège. Other expressways include those from Antwerp to Kortrijk by way of Ghent and from Brussels to Paris through Mons and Charleroi.
The railway network, a state enterprise, is one of the densest in the world. Brussels is the heart of the system, the centre of a series of lines that radiate outward and link the capital to other cities both inside and outside the country. The heaviest traffic is between Brussels and Antwerp.
Central Liège, cut by the Meuse River, Belgium.
Antwerp handles a major portion of the country’s foreign trade through its port. Other important ports are Zeebrugge-Brugge, Ostend, Ghent, and Brussels. Navigable inland waterways include the Meuse and the Schelde, which are navigable throughout their length in Belgium. A canal from Charleroi to Brussels links the basins of the two main rivers through the Ronquières lock. The Albert Canal links Antwerp with the Liège region. A maritime canal connects Brugge and Zeebrugge; another connects Ghent and Terneuzen (Netherlands), on the Schelde estuary; and a third links Brussels and Antwerp.
The Brussels international airport is the centre of Belgian air traffic. Smaller international facilities are maintained at Antwerp, Liège, Charleroi, and Ostend. Partly owned by the state, an international airline, SABENA, operated from 1923 to 2001. Its place has been taken by Brussels Airlines.
Belgium’s technologically advanced telecommunications network is well developed, with a number of companies offering traditional telephone, cellular telephone, cable, and other telecommunications services. Cellular telephone and Internet usage in Belgium is similar to that of other western European countries, although Belgians own fewer personal computers than their immediate neighbours.
Government and society
Constitutional framework
Belgium is a constitutional monarchy. The Belgian constitution was first promulgated in 1831 and has been revised a number of times since then. A 1991 constitutional amendment, for instance, allows for the accession of a woman to the throne.
Belgian royal family members (from left) Prince Philippe, Queen Paola, King Albert II, and Princess Mathilde, 2008.
Under the terms of the Belgian constitution, national executive power is vested in the monarch and his Council of Ministers, whereas legislative power is shared by the monarch, a bicameral parliament comprising the Chamber of Representatives and the Senate, and the community and regional councils. In practice, the monarch’s role as head of state is limited to representative and official functions; royal acts must be countersigned by a minister, who in turn becomes responsible for them to the parliament.
The prime minister is the effective head of government; the position of prime minister was created in 1919 and that of vice prime minister in 1961. Typically the leader of the majority party or coalition in the parliament, the prime minister is appointed by the monarch and approved by the parliament.
Local government
Prior to 1970 Belgium was a unitary state. An unwritten rule prevailed that, except for the prime minister, the government had to include as many Flemish- as French-speaking ministers. Tensions that had been building throughout the 20th century between the two ethnolinguistic groups led to major administrative restructuring during the 1970s, ’80s, and ’90s. A series of constitutional reforms dismantled the unitary state, culminating in the St. Michael’s Agreement (September 1992), which laid the groundwork for the establishment of the federal state (approved by the parliament in July 1993 and enshrined in a new, coordinated constitution in 1994). National authorities now share power with executive and legislative bodies representing the major politically defined regions (Flemish: gewesten; French: régions) of Belgium—the Flemish Region (Flanders), the Walloon Region (Wallonia), and the Brussels-Capital Region—and the major language communities of the country (Flemish, French, and German). The Flemish Region—comprising the provinces of Antwerp, Limburg, East Flanders, West Flanders, and Flemish Brabant—and the Flemish Community are represented by a single council; the Walloon Region—comprising the provinces of Hainaut, Namur, Liège, Luxembourg, and Walloon Brabant—and the French Community each have a council, as do the Brussels-Capital Region and the German Community. The regional authorities have primary responsibility for the environment, energy, agriculture, transportation, and public works. They share responsibility for economic matters, labour, and foreign trade with the national government, which also retains responsibility for defense, foreign policy, and justice. The community councils have authority over cultural matters, including the use of language and education.
Farther down the administrative hierarchy are the provinces (Flemish: provincies), each of which is divided into arrondissements and further subdivided into communes (gemeenten). The provinces are under the authority of a governor, with legislative power exercised by the provincial council. The Permanent Deputation, elected from the members of the provincial council, provides for daily provincial administration. Each commune is headed by a burgomaster, and the communal council elects the deputy mayors.
Justice
Judges are appointed for life by the monarch; they cannot be removed except by judicial sentence. At the cantonal, or lowest, judicial level, justices of the peace decide civil and commercial cases, and police tribunals decide criminal cases. At the district level, judicial powers are divided among the tribunals of first instance, which are subdivided into civil, criminal, and juvenile courts and commercial and labour tribunals. At the appeals level, the courts of appeal include civil, criminal, and juvenile divisions that are supplemented by labour courts. Courts of assizes sit in each province to judge crimes and political and press offenses. These are composed of 3 judges and 12 citizens chosen by lot.
The Supreme Court of Justice is composed of three chambers: civil and commercial, criminal, and one for matters of social and fiscal law and the armed forces. The last court does not deal with cases in depth but regulates the application of the law throughout all jurisdictions. The military jurisdictions judge all cases concerning offenders responsible to the army and, in time of war, those concerning persons accused of treason. The State Council arbitrates in disputed administrative matters and gives advice on all bills and decrees. The Arbitration Court, established in 1984, deals with disputes that develop between and among national, regional, and community executive or legislative authorities.
Political process
Communal and provincial elections take place every six years, regional and community council elections occur every five years, and national elections are held at least every five years. Deputies to the Chamber of Representatives are elected directly, as are certain senators, while other senators are either designated by the community councils from their ranks or selected by the rest of the Senate. Each deputy and senator has a language community and a regional affiliation.
Belgium’s leading political parties were long divided into French- and Flemish-speaking wings; however, as the country moved toward federalism, the differences between these wings became more pronounced, and they became increasingly discrete organizations. The traditional parties include the Social Christians—that is, the Flemish Christian Democrats and their French counterpart, the Humanist and Democratic Center; the Socialist Party (divided into Flemish- and French-speaking branches); the Flemish Liberals and Democrats; and the French-speaking Reform Movement. Other ethnic and special-interest parties also have emerged, including French- and Flemish-speaking Green parties, Flemish separatist parties, and the right-wing National Front in Wallonia. Because representatives are elected on the basis of proportional representation, recent governments have been dominated by coalitions of the strongest parties. The Vlaams Belang, a party with a strong anti-immigrant message that succeeded the right-wing Vlaams Block, had notable electoral success in Flanders in the late 1990s and early 2000s.
All citizens age 18 and older are required to vote in national elections. They are informed of political events through the press, but, as press ownership increasingly is concentrated in fewer hands, many persons consider the medium to be unamenable to the expression of a wide range of opinions. Radio and television often organize debates and discussions that provide political information. In spite of these efforts, a degree of disaffection exists among the citizens with regard to politics. Conflicts over the competencies of different levels of government life tend to foster this sense of antipathy and often serve to heighten tensions between Flemish- and French-speaking Belgians.
Security of Belgium
The Belgian armed forces include land, air, and naval components, as well as reserve forces and a medical service. Belgium was one of the founding members of the military alliance NATO, and the organization’s headquarters are located in Brussels. A federal police force and numerous local police forces carry out law enforcement in the country.
Health and welfare
A great improvement in health conditions after World War II was due as much to the programs of social insurance, covering nearly the entire population, as to advances in medical science. In addition to the many hospitals, hundreds of centres offer specialized help in medical, psychological, and geriatric areas as well as in physical rehabilitation. Under a 1925 statute, each commune has a commission of public assistance that is represented on the communal council and provides aid to the indigent. Belgium’s welfare system, though comprehensive, has placed great strain on the national budget.
Housing
Building is encouraged in a number of ways, including government-guaranteed mortgage loans that have low interest rates. Most Belgians prefer to live in single-family houses. The rate of home ownership in Belgium is among the highest in western Europe, though the cost of housing increased significantly in the late 1990s and early 2000s. There are some shortages in housing supply, but the situation is not acute. The National Housing Society oversees public housing construction for low-income families. The state also sponsors programs to alleviate slum conditions.
Education
Freedom of education is a constitutional guarantee in Belgium, but conflicts between public and confessional (i.e., Roman Catholic) schools date almost to the founding of the kingdom and remain a delicate problem within the social fabric. A dual system of state-run schools and religious “free” schools (the latter are nearly all Roman Catholic) exists on the primary and secondary levels, with the “free” schools subsidized by the state to compensate for the abolition of fees in 1958. The language of instruction is either French, Flemish, or German, depending on the region. Secondary schools are graded into two types, one that is staffed by graduates from teachers colleges and offers technical and vocational education and another that is staffed by university graduates and offers either a classical or a modern curriculum.
In addition to numerous specialized institutions for advanced training, Belgium has several universities. The Catholic University of Leuven (Louvain; 1425) and the Free University of Brussels (1834), both formerly bilingual, were each divided into independent Flemish- and French-speaking universities (thereby creating four universities) in 1969–70. The University of Liège (1817) and the University of Mons-Hainaut (1965) teach in French, and Ghent University (1817) teaches in Flemish.
Cultural life
Cultural milieu
Belgium’s long and rich cultural and artistic heritage is epitomized in the paintings of Pieter Bruegel, the Elder, Jan van Eyck, Hans Memling, Dieric Bouts, Peter Paul Rubens, René Magritte, and Paul Delvaux (see also Flemish art); in the music of Josquin des Prez, Orlando di Lasso, Peter Benoit, and César Franck; in the dramas of Maurice Maeterlinck and Michel de Ghelderode and the novels of Georges Simenon and Marguerite Yourcenar (see also Belgian literature); in the films of Chantal Akerman and the Dardenne brothers; in the mapmaking of Gerardus Mercator; and in the many palaces, castles, town halls, and cathedrals of the Belgian cities and countryside.
The federal structure of Belgium encourages the drawing of cultural distinctions among and between Flanders, Wallonia, and the small German-speaking minority—institutionalized as formally empowered “communities.” Through educational initiatives, language promotion, and patronage of the arts, these communities see to it that regional cultures do not lose their distinctiveness. In addition, some regions are more strongly associated with particular cultural attributes than others. Flanders is particularly noted for its visual art, and various schools of painting have arisen there. In music, avant-garde tendencies have become influential in Brussels, Liège, Ghent, and Antwerp, while Hainaut remains the centre of the classical and popular traditions.
Daily life and social customs
Discover the art of making Belgian chocolates and truffles in a cooking class
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Belgium’s strong tradition of fine cuisine is expressed in its large number of top-rated restaurants. The country is known for moules frites (mussels served with french fries) as well as waffles, a popular snack item. Belgian chocolate is renowned around the world and may be considered a cultural institution. Chocolatiers such as Neuhaus, Godiva, and Leonidas, among others, are internationally acclaimed for their truffles and candies sold in small, distinctive cardboard boxes. Chocolate is one of Belgium’s main food exports, with the majority being shipped to other EU countries.
Glasses of beer in a bar in Brussels.
Beer is Belgium’s national beverage; the country has several hundred breweries and countless cafés where Belgians enjoy a great array of local brews, including the famed Trappist and lambic varieties. While the reputation of Belgian beer is often overshadowed by that of its larger neighbour, Germany, the brewing and consuming of beer within the country is a cultural institution in and of itself. Most beers have particular styles of glasses in which they are served, and a variety of seasonal brews are synonymous with various holidays and celebrations. It is also common for special brews to be created for occasions such as weddings, a tradition that is reported to have begun in the early 1900s, when nearly every village had a brewery. In many small Belgian villages, the brewer was also the mayor.
Festivals focus on regional history and the celebration of the seasons. In the Walloon area there are joyous spring festivals, such as the carnivals of Binche and Stavelot; summer festivals, such as the procession of giants at Ath and the dragon battle in Mons; and the winter festivals of St. Nicholas, Christmas, and the New Year. In Flanders these festivals have become folkloric celebrations with a religious or historical character. Notable events include the Festival of Cats in Ypres, which is held once every three years and commemorates a practice from earlier centuries of tossing cats from the tower of the Cloth Hall to keep their numbers under control. (The cats helped guard textiles kept in the Cloth Hall from rodents, but once the textiles were sold, the cats tended to proliferate.) Today the festival re-creates this practice with toy cats and, more generally, celebrates cats as a species. Another popular event is the Procession of the Holy Blood; held in Brugge, it is the modern continuation of a medieval tradition of parading through the city with what was said to be the coagulated blood of Christ—taken from his body after the descent from the cross. According to legend, the relic at the centre of the ceremony was brought back to Brugge by Thierry, the crusading count of Flanders, in the 12th century. Finally, marionette shows survive in the Toone Theatre in Brussels. The traditional folk culture is in marked contrast to modern forms of popular culture, which, as everywhere in the West, are dominated by television, cinema, and popular music.
The arts
Stoclet House, Brussels, designed by Josef Hoffmann, 1905.
Belgium’s rich heritage makes it an artistic centre of considerable importance. The paintings of the Flemish masters are on display in museums and cathedrals across the country; Belgium’s contribution to Art Nouveau is clearly evident in the Brussels cityscape, and folk culture is kept alive in a variety of indoor and outdoor museums. Among the most celebrated examples of Art Nouveau architecture in Brussels are the home of architect Baron Victor Horta, which is now a museum, and the Stoclet House, designed by Josef Hoffmann. The latter was designated a UNESCO World Heritage site in 2009.
Belgium holds several significant annual musical events, including the Queen Elisabeth International Music Competition. Belgians also have taken a foreign musical form, American jazz, and made it very much their own. The style owes much to Antoine-Joseph Sax, the Belgian-born instrument maker who invented the saxophone. Practitioners of homegrown jazz have included cabaret singer Jacques Brel, jazz harmonica player Jean (“Toots”) Thielemans, and the legendary Django Reinhardt, a Belgian-born Rom (Gypsy) who mastered a guitar style that wedded Duke Ellington to flamenco. Belgium teems with jazz clubs and bistros and hosts a number of respected jazz festivals each year. Belgians also played an important role in the creation of techno music late in the 20th century.
Literary works produced in Flanders have a style peculiar to the region, whereas in the Walloon area and in Brussels most authors write for a larger French readership that is inclined especially toward Parisian tastes. Moreover, some works that are thought of as French are written by Belgian authors living in France, and others are by writers living in Belgium who are considered French.
In Belgium the comic strip is a serious and well-respected art form that has become part of the country’s modern cultural heritage. Children throughout the world became familiar with the adventures of the boy hero Tintin, who was created by Hergé (Georges Rémi) and was featured in a comic strip that first appeared in 1929. The Smurfs, created in 1958 by Peyo (Pierre Culliford), became world famous as a television cartoon series. Brussels is home to a large comic-strip museum that attracts visitors from throughout Europe.
Cultural institutions
The Belgian artistic heritage is represented in major museums in Brussels, Ghent, Brugge, Antwerp, Charleroi, and Liège. Traditional art and architecture are preserved in a large outdoor museum near Hasselt. The most extensive collection of Central African art in the world is housed in a museum in Tervuren, a suburb of Brussels. The National Orchestra and the National Opera in Brussels enjoy world fame. The Museum of Musical Instruments, also in Brussels, has a fine collection. War monuments at Waterloo, Ypres, and Bastogne, among others, attract visitors and history buffs to Belgium from around the world.
Sports and recreation
If Belgians could play only one sport, it probably would be football (soccer). The Royal Belgian Football Association encompasses thousands of teams and clubs. Belgian’s national team, known as the Red Devils, has long been a power in international competitions. Cycling too has numerous enthusiasts, many inspired by the example of Eddy Merckx, who dominated international cycling during the 1960s and ’70s, winning the Tour de France and the Giro d’Italia five times each. Belgium also has produced a number of Olympians, including Hubert van Innis, who won six medals in archery events at the 1920 games; Ulla Werbrouck and Robert van der Walle, who dominated women’s and men’s judo in the later 20th century; and swimmer Frederik Deburghgraeve, who set a world record and won a gold medal in the men’s 100-metre breaststroke at the 1996 Olympic Games in Atlanta.
For daily recreation, most of the major cities have accessible parks. The Ardennes and the North Sea coast are major destinations for Belgians on vacation.
Media and publishing
The many daily newspapers published in Belgium are controlled by press consortiums. Among the most influential and widely read newspapers are Le Soir, De Standaard, and Het Laatste Nieuws. A German-language daily, Grenz-Echo, is published in Eupen. The majority of newspapers have some political affiliation, but only those of the socialist press are linked to a political party. Belgium has several magazines, but these face strong foreign competition.
Radio broadcasting was born in Belgium. As early as 1913, weekly musical broadcasts were given from the Laeken Royal Park. Radio-Belgium, founded in 1923, was broadcasting the equivalent of a spoken newspaper as early as 1926. Belgian Radio-Television of the French Community (RTBF), which broadcasts in French, and the Flemish Radio and Television Network (VRT; formerly Belgian Radio and Television [BRTN]), in Flemish, were created as public services. Both are autonomous and are managed by an administrative council. Radio Vlaanderen International (RVI) serves as an important voice of the Flemish community in Belgium.Arthur J.M. DoucyAlexander B. Murphy
History of Belgium
This section surveys the history of the Belgian territories after 1579. For information concerning the period prior to that date, see Low Countries, history of.
After the Burgundian regime in the Low Countries (1363–1477), the southern provinces (whose area roughly encompassed that of present-day Belgium and Luxembourg) as well as the northern provinces (whose area roughly corresponded to that of the present-day Kingdom of the Netherlands) had dynastic links with the Austrian Habsburgs and then with Spain and the Austrian Habsburgs together. Later, as a consequence of revolt in 1567, the southern provinces became subject to Spain (1579), then to the Austrian Habsburgs (1713), to France (1795), and finally in 1815 to the Kingdom of the Netherlands. While Luxembourg remained linked to the Netherlands until 1867, Belgium’s union with the Netherlands ended with the 1830 revolution. Belgian nationality is generally considered to date from this event. Throughout the long period of foreign rule, the southern part of the Low Countries generally preserved its institutions and traditions, and only for a short interval, under the First French Republic and Napoleon, could integration with an alien system be enforced.
The Burgundian period, from Philip II (the Bold) to Charles the Bold, was one of political prestige and economic and artistic splendour. The “Great Dukes of the West,” as the Burgundian princes were called, were effectively considered national sovereigns, their domains extending from the Zuiderzee to the Somme. The urban and other textile industries, which had developed in the Belgian territories since the 12th century, became under the Burgundians the economic mainstay of northwestern Europe.
The death of Charles the Bold (1477) and the marriage of his daughter Mary to the archduke Maximilian of Austria proved fatal to the independence of the Low Countries by bringing them increasingly under the sway of the Habsburg dynasty. Mary and Maximilian’s grandson Charles became king of Spain as Charles I in 1516 and Holy Roman emperor as Charles V in 1519. In Brussels on October 25, 1555, Charles V abdicated the Netherlands to his son, who in January 1556 assumed the throne of Spain as Philip II.
The Spanish Netherlands
Under Spanish rule, discontent increased in the Netherlands and revolution broke out in 1567, but the union between the south and the north could not be maintained after the first years of conflict.
The formation of the Union of Arras (January 6, 1579) by the conservative Catholic provinces of Artois and Hainaut (fearing the dominance of more urban, more commercial, and therefore more progressive provinces) enabled the Spanish commander Alessandro Farnese to resume war against the rebellious Protestants. William I (of Orange) emerged as the leader of the latter group, supported by the Union of Utrecht (January 23, 1579), and rallied the numerous provinces that opposed a return to Spanish rule. After a series of sieges, however, Farnese made himself master of many towns in the southern part of the country and finally, on August 17, 1585, recaptured Antwerp, which had closed its gates to rebels and government forces alike. Antwerp’s surrender incited the still resisting northern provinces to close the Schelde River to foreign shipping. From this time onward, the whole of the southern part of the Netherlands once more recognized Philip II as its sovereign. In 1598 Philip II granted the sovereignty of the Netherlands to his daughter Isabella Clara Eugenia and her husband, Archduke Albert VII of Austria.
The United Provinces of the north, also known as the Dutch Republic, were never recovered, and in 1609 Albert was even forced to join them in a 12-year truce. He died in 1621, the same year that the war was resumed. Isabella was, from that time on, nothing more than a governor-general. During the resumed course of the war (1621–48), the region to the east of the Meuse, northern Brabant, and Zeeland were lost. Philip IV of Spain agreed to the new northern boundary of the Spanish Netherlands in the Peace of Westphalia (1648). Hostilities between France and Spain persisted, marked by further losses of territory on the southern border (Artois in 1640 and parts of Flanders in the later 17th century).
Administration
The government of the Spanish Netherlands, though not independent, enjoyed a large degree of autonomy. A governor-general, usually a member of the Spanish royal family, represented the king in Brussels. Local leaders held most positions on the three councils that assisted the governor (the Council of State, the Privy Council, and the Council of Finances). The president of the Privy Council became a kind of prime minister; although holders of this office did not hesitate to show independence of Madrid in order to protect their interests, they remained supporters of absolutism, regularly asserting the authority of the royal government at the expense of regional and local rights. After 1664 the Council of Finances, under its chief official, the treasurer-general, began to function as a sort of ministry of economic affairs. The councils exercised considerable autonomy domestically. With respect to foreign policy, however, they were controlled less by the governor-general than by a Spanish official in Brussels called the secretary of state and war. In Madrid there was a council of state for the Netherlands made up of natives of the Belgian provinces.
The bishopric of Liège (in present-day eastern Belgium) was ruled as a separate principality by its prince-bishops, as had been the case since the Middle Ages. During the revolt against Spain, Liège maintained a strict neutrality and continued to do so through most of the 17th and 18th centuries. Its institutional development paralleled that of the neighbouring regions.
The most important of various representative bodies in the Spanish Netherlands were the provincial estates or assemblies. Their authority to levy and collect taxes enabled them to ensure that a considerable portion of the revenue was spent within the country. A permanent deputation drawn from the estates supervised public works. The States General, consisting of delegates from all the provincial estates, had enjoyed great influence before and during the revolt against Spain. From that time their role diminished, and after 1632 the States General no longer met. Regionalism, deep-rooted in the provinces during the 16th century, gave way in the 17th century to a wider unity. The aristocratic provincial governors revolted against the government’s centralizing policy in the early 1630s but were forced to flee the country for lack of urban support. By 1700 only Hainaut, Luxembourg, Namur, Limburg, and south Gelderland, all of which had proved their loyalty, still had provincial governors.
The supreme authority in judicial matters was the Great Council of Malines, founded in 1504. This body, however, had to defend its jurisdiction against the encroachments of the Privy Council. The provincial courts of justice were the councils of Flanders, Brabant, Namur, Luxembourg, southern Gelderland, Hainaut, and Artois (until 1659). The unique autonomy of the Council of Brabant had been granted by the king in conformity with the provincial liberties of that region. Nevertheless, after 1603 the king was represented in Brabant by financial officials under a procurer-general. In addition to their judicial duties, all these magistrates had increasing administrative functions.
Nearly constant warfare made the administration of the country increasingly difficult. Foreign troops manned the fortresses of Antwerp, Ghent, Ostend, and Charleroi, and other armed forces were raised locally. Government finances, weakened by the loss of revenues from the northern provinces, suffered still further from the enormous military expenditures.
Economic developments
The revolt against Spain in 1567 and the military campaigns it provoked in the following years were detrimental to industrial activity in the southern provinces. Moreover, the Spanish reconquest of the territory caused a major emigration of merchants and skilled artisans. Amsterdam replaced Antwerp as the chief trading centre of Europe. Many towns facing industrial decline reacted by restructuring their economic bases. Antwerp fostered new enterprises in silk weaving, diamond processing, and the production of fine linen, furniture, and lace; in addition, it resuscitated many old export products, such as musical instruments, tapestries, embroidery, and brass. Although English competition had crippled the Flemish woolen industry, Ghent developed a specialization in luxury fabrics, and Brugge in cloth for everyday use.
From the end of the 16th century on, import and export duties provided a new source of revenue. Taxes on foreign trade originated from permits allowing commerce with the rebellious United Provinces of the north. By the middle of the 17th century, these taxes had become real customs tariffs. The financial problems of the government also made the sale of public offices a common practice.
The commercial revitalization of the southern Low Countries, particularly of Antwerp, was gradual, but it no doubt partly explains the flourishing artistic life during the period. This was chiefly evident in the works of the Flemish school of 17th-century painters—among them Peter Paul Rubens, Anthony Van Dyck, and Jacob Jordaens. The ongoing Counter-Reformation stimulated demand for art in the triumphant Baroque style. Rubens, court painter to Isabella and Archduke Albert, made Antwerp one of the cultural capitals of Europe. In the area of scholarship, the Bollandists, a group of Antwerp Jesuits, made valuable contributions to historical methodology.
The Peace of Westphalia (1648), which ended the Eighty Years’ War between Spain and the Dutch and the German phase of the Thirty Years’ War, stimulated economic competition between the countries of northern Europe. As a result, Flemish textile manufacture once again shifted from the towns to the countryside, where production costs were lower. In addition, the burgeoning bureaucracies and new mercantilist policies of rival capitals attracted many Flemish artisans. Emerging fashions abroad, particularly the Enlightenment Classicism and colonial exoticism of France and England, were soon to overtake the Baroque style of the Spanish Netherlands.
The Austrian Netherlands
In 1700 the Spanish Habsburg dynasty died out with Charles II, and a new conflict with France arose. By the Treaty of Utrecht (1713), ending the War of the Spanish Succession, the territory comprising present-day Belgium and Luxembourg (the independent principality of Liège not included) passed under the sovereignty of the Holy Roman emperor Charles VI, head of the Austrian branch of the house of Habsburg.
Under the Austrians, as under the Spanish Habsburgs, the southern Netherlands enjoyed political autonomy. The Austrian government initially modernized the Spanish institutions internally by introducing a new working spirit and more efficient administrative methods. To a greater degree than under Spanish rule, appointments to public offices depended upon competence and dedication. Apart from attempting to subject the provinces and the class-ridden society to absolute imperial power, the Austrian government focused in particular on rationalizing public finances at all levels, on the formation of a dynamic, well-documented bureaucracy, and on the improvement of the country’s infrastructure.
Emperor Charles VI attempted to relieve the economic distress in the southern Netherlands by founding the Ostend Company (1722) to trade with Asia, but England and the United Provinces forced him after a few years to abandon the project. At the death of Charles VI in 1740, the southern Netherlands passed to his daughter Maria Theresa. The War of the Austrian Succession, however, resulted in a new French occupation in 1744. Austrian rule was restored by the Treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle (1748).
The regime of the empress Maria Theresa of Austria enjoyed popularity as the economic situation began to improve again toward the middle of the 18th century. As in contemporary England, an increase in agricultural productivity stimulated a population increase, especially in rural areas. This, in turn, spurred the development of various industries. The agricultural transformation occurred mainly on the small farms of Flanders; one of its main features was the spread of potato cultivation, which added an important element to the diet of the rural population. In addition, in the French-speaking part of the country, a number of landed proprietors invested in mining enterprises, notably in the area between the Sambre and the Meuse rivers, which belonged to the principality of Liège. In the southern Netherlands, urban merchants and manufacturers had more in common with the rural landowning class than was usual in continental European countries in the 18th century. As in the case of Britain, this created an atmosphere favourable to the development of industrial capitalism. During this period Ghent, Antwerp, and Tournai had factories with more than 100 workers; wages, however, were poor. Verviers, in the principality of Liège, was an important centre for woolen manufactures, Ghent for cotton goods.
After 1750 the influence of the Enlightenment permeated government policy in the domains of demography, social relief, employment, public health, education, religion, culture, and art, mainly at the expense of the Roman Catholic Church. Religious suppression and administrative reforms, sponsored by Maria Theresa’s son and successor, the emperor Joseph II, caused great dissatisfaction among the upper classes. The Austrian government was no longer inclined to maintain the remnants of feudal privilege. Reforms deepened to include replacement of the traditional provinces and their aristocracies by districts and newly appointed intendants. The proposal to suppress simultaneously the central councils and the provincial courts of justice constituted a clear threat to provincial autonomy. The governor-general of the Austrian Netherlands was reluctant to enforce the edicts involved, but other leading members of the administration, including the emperor’s minister plenipotentiary, insisted upon the abolishment of the traditional bodies.
In 1789, stirred by the outbreak of revolution in neighbouring France, conservatives led by Henri van der Noot and progressives led by Jean-François Vonck united in opposition to the emperor and defeated an Austrian force at Turnhout. After their common victory, conservatives and progressives came into conflict. The conservatives, or Statists, in the end gained the upper hand and made a triumphant entry into Brussels. This “Brabant Revolution” (so called because most of its leaders came from Brabant) had widespread support in the towns. The peasants, on the other hand, had little in common with the middle-class revolutionaries and generally supported the Austrians. Thus, when Leopold II, successor to Joseph II, decided to reestablish imperial authority in 1790, he encountered no opposition from the mass of the people. On December 2, 1790, imperial troops reoccupied Brussels. The discontented Statists now looked to revolutionary France for support, but enthusiasm waned when it became clear that a French military victory was the prelude to annexation. On October 1, 1795, the French National Convention voted to annex the southern Netherlands and the principality of Liège, where a revolution against the prince-bishop had prepared the country for assimilation into the French Republic. Thenceforth, the territory of Liège was amalgamated with the Belgian provinces.
French administration
Under French rule there was no autonomy as there had been under the Spanish and Austrian regimes. The administration was centralized, aristocratic privileges abolished, and the church persecuted. Military conscription measures provoked a peasants’ revolt (1798–99), but repression was extremely harsh. Under the Napoleonic consulate and empire (1799–1814), the position of the clergy was regulated by a concordat with the papacy. Further changes included introduction of the French civil code and the decimal metric system and the reopening of the Schelde River to maritime traffic to and from the harbour of Antwerp.
The period of the Napoleonic empire may be considered the beginning of the Industrial Revolution in Belgium. Only at the very end of the 18th century, with the prospects of a wider market and under Napoleon’s encouragement, did mechanization (i.e., the Industrial Revolution in its strictest sense) begin in the textile sector. Mechanization quickly made Ghent, with its cotton mills, and Verviers, with its woolen industry, the leading textile centres of the country. The coal and metal industries of Hainaut (under French rule, the département of Jemappes) and Liège also flourished. From the beginning of the 18th century, the coal industry had expanded production with the help of the Newcomen pump and systematically extended its export markets to France (see Thomas Newcomen). Annexation of the Belgian provinces by France opened the market still further, hastening the modernization process in which Belgium already led the continent.
The Kingdom of the Netherlands
After the defeat of Napoleon, the Allied powers were determined not to leave the Belgian territories in the hands of France. Under the influence of Great Britain, it was decided that the territories would be united in a single state with the old republic of the United Provinces, thus to constitute a better barrier against French expansion than that of 1715. The Kingdom of the Netherlands, the existence of which was confirmed by the Congress of Vienna (June 1815), was thus established for the convenience of Europe, regardless of the wishes of the Belgians and the Dutch. Prince William of Orange ascended the throne on March 16, 1815, under the title William I; he was crowned September 27.
The two parts of the Netherlands, which had been one country until the 16th century and were now reunited, had developed in markedly different ways during the two intervening centuries. The north was commercial and the south increasingly industrial; the north was Protestant and Flemish- (Dutch-) speaking and the south Roman Catholic and partly French-speaking (the elite was entirely French-speaking). Under the Dutch house of Orange, the north was to be predominant. Dutch, sometimes called Netherlandic, became the official language of the new kingdom; moreover, the fundamental law gave Belgium and Holland the same number of representatives in the States General, in spite of the fact that the population of Belgium was nearly twice that of the former United Provinces. Belgian representatives, members of the nobility, rejected the constitution, but it was promulgated by the king over their objections.
William I encouraged the industrialization of the south, commissioning the construction of new roads and canals and the establishment of new commercial and financial companies; he also extended subsidies to promising industrial enterprises, frequently from his own private fortune. In the beginning, the favourable economic situation reinforced the king’s popularity among the middle class. The mechanized textile industries of Ghent and Verviers continued their progress, while the modern coal mines and forges of Liège and Hainaut prospered. Antwerp’s role as an international port was expanding rapidly.
King William I also created three state universities: Ghent and Liège, which were new, and Louvain, which he put under state control to remove it from Catholic influence. Secular academies (athénées) were established at the secondary level, and state inspection was mandated for church-controlled schools. An attempt to interfere with the curriculum of the training schools for priests (1825) brought clerical dissatisfaction with the government to its height. In an effort to disengage the Protestant monarch from the religious affairs of the south, the clergy and traditional Catholic elite began clamouring for freedom of religion, education, and association. This remarkable shift in mentality within the ranks of the southern conservatives was welcomed by the more progressive merchants, who in their turn had grown more critical toward the north and the king’s policy.
After 1821 the conflicting interests of north and south also created an economic split. The commercial north, having little industry, desired more free trade; the industrial south sought greater tariff protection in order to compete against falling British export prices. The king’s unwillingness to increase protection gave the industrialists a grievance against the government. Progressives and clericals now joined forces. Both groups wanted to curtail the personal power of the king in favour of a true parliamentary system, based on an expanded range of civil and political rights. In this new climate, Unionism came into being in 1827, merging young Catholics and liberals in the south into a strong antigovernment coalition. The king agreed to make concessions regarding matters of religion and language but refused to relinquish his ultimate authority. This refusal generated the “Belgian Revolution” of August–September 1830, in the tracks of the July Revolution in Paris the same year.
The revolutionaries at first demanded separate administrations for the northern and southern Netherlands. The actions of the radical patriots in Liège, however, soon aggravated the situation. The unyielding attitude of the king now led to a complete break. On September 25 a provisional Belgian government was established, and on October 4 it proclaimed the country’s independence, a move reaffirmed by the newly elected National Congress on November 10. William I prepared for war, but on December 20 the great powers intervened, imposing an armistice on both sides. On January 20, 1831, an international conference in London (under the influence of the new liberal governments in France and Britain) recognized Belgium as an independent, neutral state, its neutrality to be guaranteed by the European powers.
Independent Belgium before World War I
The National Congress had decided that Belgium should be a monarchy, but finding a king proved difficult. In the end, Prince Leopold of Saxe-Coburg, who was related to the British royal family and who became engaged to the daughter of the French king, was acceptable to both Britain and France. On July 21, 1831, Leopold ascended the throne, promising to support the liberal constitution, which gave the greater part of the governing power to a parliament elected by property owners. Some days later, the Dutch army invaded Belgium. The Belgians, who had no regular army, were defeated, but the London Conference agreed to intervention by the French army, which forced the Dutch to withdraw. The conference then decided to divide the provinces of Limburg and Luxembourg, assigning part to Belgium and part to the Netherlands. William I refused to accept this settlement. The Belgians, therefore, continued to occupy Dutch Limburg and Luxembourg until William finally relented in 1838. The eastern half of Luxembourg became the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg, while the western half became a Belgian province. In 1839 the Dutch government officially recognized Belgium in its borders of 1838.
In the short run, the revolution had a detrimental effect on the economy. Separation from the north resulted in the sudden loss of the large Dutch market, including the colonies. The Schelde River remained closed until 1839. The Belgian government addressed the crisis by launching a vigorous policy of internal investment. In 1835 it inaugurated a railroad line between Brussels and Malines, the first to operate on the continent. The Antwerp-Cologne line, completed in 1843, opened great prospects for the Belgo-German transit trade. In 1844 a favourable trade agreement between Belgium and the German Zollverein (“Customs Union”) completed this strategy.
Private participation in the development program was encouraged. In the case of railroads, for example, the government restricted itself to the construction of main lines as an incentive for private enterprise to provide the secondary network. The modernization of the infrastructure, in turn, created a climate conducive to industrial investment. Belgian banks played a decisive role in the response, in particular the Société Générale, founded in 1822 by King William I, and the Banque de Belgique, founded in 1835 by Belgian liberals. Both companies provided extensive financing for the new mechanized sectors, especially those of the Walloon heavy industry. Converting these enterprises into limited companies, the banks sold shares to the public while holding enough shares in their own or their subsidiaries’ portfolios to retain control. Through this and other measures, including extension of long- and short-term credit to developing companies and the establishment of savings banks to augment resources, the Brussels banks created a new type of financial organization, the industrial banking system, which would soon be imitated by the French, the Germans, and later the English-speaking world.
While the Walloon industrial economy expanded rapidly with the infusion of capital, the mechanized textile industry in Flanders remained less dynamic. The Brussels banks exhibited little interest in this industry in the region because it was splintered over many small family enterprises. Moreover, the Ghent cotton industry faced the formidable competition of the British, and Flemish woolen producers had lost the advantage to those of Verviers and northern France. The mechanized linen mills fared better but precipitated, along with their British counterparts, a disastrous decline in the traditional linen industry based on cottage spinning and weaving throughout rural Flanders. The crisis reached a climax with the famine of 1844–46, when poor grain harvests coincided with a potato blight. The deep impoverishment of the Flemish countryside retarded the full modernization of the region until the beginning of the 20th century.
Liberal dominance
After 1839, the Unionist coalition that had consolidated the revolution showed signs of falling apart. The progressives, especially, were unhappy with the growing influence of the Roman Catholic Church and with the government, which increasingly enacted the personal policy of the monarch. In 1846 middle-class anticlericals laid the foundation for a national liberal party independent of the Unionist movement, aiming in particular at the curtailment of the church’s growing social position. Later, a Roman Catholic conservative party took shape in opposition. Thus, one of the ideological polarities of modern Belgian politics was born.
The first Liberal government came to power in 1847 and withstood the revolutionary shock wave that rocked Europe the following year (see Revolutions of 1848). Electoral reforms, hastened by international circumstances, secured the long-standing political dominance of the Liberal urban bourgeoisie.
The Liberal governments broadened the free-trade policy in order to promote industrialization and commercial expansion and lifted a number of fiscal hindrances on internal trade. The great Liberal reformer Walthère Frère-Orban took special measures to reinforce Belgium’s economic infrastructure: in 1850 he founded a central issuing bank (the National Bank of Belgium), in 1860 a public cooperative bank for municipal finances (the Communal Credit), and five years later a public savings bank (the General Savings Bank). By 1863 the prosperity of the country permitted redemption of the Netherlands’ right to levy charges on ships entering the Schelde estuary, a right enacted in 1839. The port of Antwerp was the great beneficiary, able to compete strongly with Rotterdam (Netherlands) and Hamburg. Favourable trade agreements with France, Britain, and the Netherlands further stimulated the Belgian export and transit trade. The importation of grain was also fully liberalized, without noticeable objection from the agrarian pressure groups, as the prices of grain, rent, and land remained quite high until the 1870s.
On the political scene, the growing social influence of the church became a matter of passionate public debate. As the controversy mounted, the respective attitudes became more and more radicalized. Among the Liberals, anticlericalism frequently evolved into antireligiosity; among the Catholics, the defense of the church increasingly became a means to acquire political power. The Liberals, controlling the government, managed to curtail the church’s influence in such crucial domains as public charity and public education. The church successively lost its influence in the state secondary schools and in the state universities. When the Liberal government eliminated religious education from public primary schools, the so-called School War erupted. This conflict strengthened the Catholics in their distrust of the state and prompted the development of a state-independent Catholic school network, which met with great success. The School War precipitated a conservative landslide in the elections of 1884, which gave the Catholics a majority in both chambers of the parliament.
Period of Catholic government
Aside from the education controversy, the biggest factor in the Liberals’ defeat was probably their advocacy of free trade, which was favoured by manufacturers but exposed farmers to ruinous foreign competition. In the early 1880s, when the Belgian market was flooded with American grain, the Catholic Party became the champion of the rural classes by promising to protect agriculture. It also espoused the cause of the nascent Flemish movement that sought to expand opportunities for Flemish-speaking Belgians in a country until then dominated by a French-speaking upper bourgeoisie.
The last years of the 19th century and the first of the 20th were years of social tension. In 1886 there was a disturbance among workers in Liège, followed by unrest in other industrial areas. The Catholic government of Auguste-Marie-François Beernaert suppressed this movement harshly, but, beginning in 1889, a series of laws were passed regulating workers’ housing, limiting labour by women and children, and providing workmen’s compensation. Because of the system of electoral property qualifications, the working class did not have the right to vote until after the legislature revised the constitution in 1890; in 1893 universal suffrage was adopted for men age 25 and over. Though the effect of this law was weakened by giving a plural vote to electors fulfilling certain conditions of income, age, and education and to heads of families, it resulted in the election of the first Socialist deputies to the legislature. The Equality Law of 1898 made Flemish an official language, on a par with French. Social legislation benefited from the improving economic climate of the 1890s. The Flemish provinces were now fully engaged in the Industrial Revolution, the mechanization process having penetrated into the textile industries of the small towns and villages.
Belgian industry, dominated by powerful financial groups, began to assume worldwide importance and was active in Asia and Latin America, as well as in Europe. In Africa, King Leopold II acquired the Congo Free State as a personal possession in 1885. While employing brutal methods to suppress rebellion, Leopold’s regime forced the Congolese to work in mines and to gather rubber, palm oil, and ivory for export. The completion in 1898 of the Matadi-Léopoldville (now Kinshasa) railroad, which facilitated access to the interior of the Congo River basin, prompted Belgian banks to push for annexation by the Belgian government. Mounting international indignation over Leopold’s harsh rule of the Congo Free State eventually forced the king to hand over his control to the Belgian parliament in 1908.
The rivalry between France and Germany in the period 1870–1914 constituted a continuous danger to neutral Belgium. King Leopold II and his successor, King Albert I, sought vigorously to strengthen the Belgian armed forces but met resistance from the Belgian Catholic Party governments, which reflected the antimilitaristic sentiments of their grassroots constituency. In 1909 the army recruitment system, which until then had favoured the wealthy by allowing them to hire substitutes for military service, was finally reformed.
Through two world wars
Belgium and World War I
As international tensions heightened during the summer of 1914, Germany made plans to besiege France by crossing Luxembourg and Belgium, despite their neutrality. The two countries refused free passage to the German troops and were invaded on August 2 and August 4, respectively. The Belgian army retired behind the Yser (IJzer) River in the west of Flanders and held this position until 1918. During the war, the Belgian government sat at Le Havre, France, while King Albert I, as commander in chief of the army, remained with his troops in unoccupied Belgium. In 1916 the Belgian Catholic Party government was enlarged to include some Socialists and Liberals. Germany attempted to profit from Flemish-Walloon antagonism in Belgium by supporting the Flemish Activists, a radical nationalist group that accepted the German offer of assistance. Most Flemings, however, were resolutely hostile to collaboration with the enemy and refused to recognize either the Council of Flanders, founded during the occupation, or the University of Ghent, changed during the occupation from a French-language to a Flemish-language institution. (Shortly after liberation, the Belgian government made the State University of Ghent partially and then, in 1930, completely Flemish.) (See also World War I.)
The interwar period
The Treaty of Versailles (1919), ending World War I, abolished Belgium’s obligatory neutrality and returned the cantons of Eupen and Malmédy to its territory. In 1920 a treaty of military assistance was signed with France. In 1921 an economic union was concluded with Luxembourg that tied the currencies of Belgium and Luxembourg together. Belgium’s eastern frontier was guaranteed by the Pact of Locarno (1925). In Africa, Belgium received the mandate for Ruanda-Urundi, a part of German East Africa that Belgian colonial forces had occupied during World War I.
On the domestic front, political democratization and trade unionism, as well as social legislation and the Flemish movement, gathered momentum in postwar Belgium. Upon their return to Brussels in November 1918, the king and his government announced the introduction of absolute universal suffrage for all men over the age of 21, implying the abandonment of plural voting. The first elections held following this reform ended the Catholic domination of Belgian politics. Coalition governments, mostly Catholic-Liberal, were the rule in the interwar period. However, the Socialist Party, which had emerged during the social democracy movement of the late 19th century, became increasingly prominent. The anti-Bolshevist climate of the time, nonetheless, resulted in a persisting aversion to socialism among the middle class. The Belgian Socialists and the Liberals both opposed woman suffrage, regarding it as most advantageous to the Belgian Catholic Party. (Only in 1948 did Belgian women gain the right to vote in national elections.) Within the Belgian Catholic Party, the centre of gravity shifted during the interwar period from the old conservative camp to the Christian Democratic wing as Christian trade unionism experienced a significant upsurge. Both Christian Democrats and Socialists stimulated social legislation, especially during the years of Socialist participation in the government.
The Belgian economy of the interwar period faced serious difficulties. The war had caused a loss of 16 to 20 percent of the national wealth; not only had parts of the country been seriously damaged by combat, but the Germans had largely dismantled the Walloon heavy industry. Moreover, many Belgian investors had lost their capital in Russia, which had been transformed by revolution into the Soviet Union. Reconstruction proved difficult for other reasons as well. Germany was delinquent and inadequate in its payment of war reparations mandated by the Treaty of Versailles. The National Bank of Belgium, in an effort to redress the shortfall, advanced on behalf of the Belgian government the money needed for reconstruction. In so doing, however, the bank increased still further the money supply and the government’s already massive short-term debt, which had originated from the conversion into Belgian francs of the German marks circulating in Belgium at war’s end. Under such circumstances, inflation was inevitable. Soaring exchange rates generated an acute flight of capital and an imbalance of payments. Inflation also eroded the increase in real wages, which the Socialists and Christian Democrats had been able to obtain in the democratization euphoria of the immediate postwar years.
The government, which had originally hoped to restore the gold standard at its prewar parity level, soon realized that such a policy had become impossible. Increasing monetary and financial instability and fear of hyperinflation with possibly dangerous social consequences led to the formation in 1925 of a national union government, intent on restoring the gold standard but at a more realistic parity level. The reform failed, precipitating the fall of the government in March 1926. The subsequent Catholic-Liberal coalition government succeeded in restoring the gold standard on October 22, 1926, at 20 percent of its prewar level. Belgian capital returned to the country, and, because of the franc’s undervaluation, much foreign capital flowed in as well. Belgian companies, infused with fresh capital, began to invest again outside Belgium, under the leadership of the mixed banks. The discovery of rich mineral deposits in the Belgian Congo made colonial development schemes increasingly attractive. Large-scale investments in southeastern and south-central Europe partly replaced the lost Russian accounts. Owing to the franc’s undervaluation, the export industries in Flanders and Wallonia also were booming. The overall prosperity generated speculative excesses, particularly on the Brussels Exchange, which was now an important capital market.
The perceived neglect of and discrimination against Flemish soldiers at the Yser front during the war, coupled with the lack of official response to postwar Flemish demands, caused a marked shift to the right among many Flemings. In 1930 the Belgian government acquiesced somewhat to the pressure, making Flanders and Wallonia legally unilingual regions, with only Brussels and its surroundings remaining bilingual. The arrangement left the linguistic borders unfixed, the government’s hope being that the Frenchification of central Belgium would continue and allow eventually for enlargement of the French-speaking region.
The Belgian economy was, of course, jolted by the stock market crash of 1929 in the United States, but Britain’s decision two years later to abandon the gold standard and allow the pound to float affected the country much more severely. Still traumatized by the experience of the 1920s, the Belgian government decided to maintain the gold parity of 1926, which left the franc seriously overvalued as the pound sterling and dollar fell. Belgian exports declined sharply, as did business profits and investments, while unemployment soared, heightening the atmosphere of social unrest. Only in March 1935 would the government abandon its policy of maintaining the franc at its 1926 level; the gold value of the franc was devalued by 28 percent.
With the onset of the Great Depression, the Socialist Party advocated a program of economic planning in accordance with the ideas of the socialist theorist Hendrik de Man. At the same time, there emerged two Belgian parties: a strictly Flemish party that enjoyed little success and the broader-based Rexists under the leadership of Léon Degrelle. The latter party won 21 seats, more than 10 percent of the chamber, in the elections of 1936. Strikes broke out in the same year and led the tripartite government of Paul van Zeeland to establish paid holidays for workers and a 40-hour workweek for miners. Also in 1936, the first National Labour Convention marked the starting point of an institutionalized dialogue between the so-called social partners (employers, trade unions, and government).
Meanwhile, King Leopold III, who succeeded his father, Albert I, in 1934, faced an increasingly tense international situation. Leopold advocated a policy of neutrality aimed at keeping Belgium from the seemingly inevitable conflict. Although this policy was approved by the parliament, Belgium, in its determination to resist all aggression, constructed a line of defense from Namur to Antwerp.
Nazi occupation
On May 10, 1940, Germany invaded Belgium, Luxembourg, and the Netherlands. The Netherlands capitulated after 6 days, Belgium after 18. France, which along with Britain had sent troops to Belgium, had to lay down arms three weeks later. The British troops, covered by the Belgian army, retreated from Dunkirk, France, in particularly dramatic circumstances. The Belgian government fled the country, first to France, in hopes of being able to return to occupied Belgium, and later to London. King Leopold III, commander in chief of the army, refused to follow the government and was taken prisoner by the Germans and confined to his palace at Laeken. The four years of ensuing Nazi occupation were distinguished by a growing resistance organization. When the Allied forces reached Belgium on September 3, 1944, the Belgian underground army was able to prevent the destruction of the port of Antwerp, which served as the most important continental provisioning point for Allied troops for the remainder of the war. (See also World War II.)
Belgium after World War II
Because of the limited extent of its war damage, estimated at only 8 percent of the national wealth, and the implementation of a vigorous government policy, Belgium experienced a remarkable economic resurgence in the early postwar years. Monetary reform kept inflation under control, and liberalization of the domestic economy quickly returned the market mechanisms to the centre of the industrial, agricultural, and commercial activities. In the climate of recovery, social legislation won the support of both unions and employers.
The investigation of wartime economic and especially political collaboration with Germany resulted in large-scale purges and the detention of many citizens. The extreme rightist parties disappeared from the political scene. The Communist Party, having identified very early with the resistance movement, experienced a short-lived growth, taking part in coalition governments between 1944 and 1947; the anticommunist reflex during the Cold War brought this interlude to an end.
Despite the economic revival, political stability deteriorated, notably over the “royal question.” In 1944, at the time of the Allied offensive, the Germans had transferred King Leopold III to Austria, where he was held until 1945. The government, upon returning to Brussels in early September 1944, conferred the regency on the king’s brother, Prince Charles. After the war Leopold remained in exile in Switzerland until the “royal question” could be resolved. Generally speaking, the Flemish were the king’s partisans and the Walloons his opponents. The Christian Democrats favoured the king’s return, while the Socialists and Liberals opposed it. In 1950 a referendum showed that nearly 58 percent of the voters approved of the return of the sovereign, but the king’s arrival that year signaled virtual civil war in the Walloon country. In August 1950 Leopold appointed his eldest son, Prince Baudouin, to rule temporarily in his place. In July 1951 he abdicated, and Baudouin officially assumed the title of king.
The composition of the government continued to fluctuate, although from the 1950s onward the Christian Democrats maintained a continuous presence, often in coalition with the Socialists. Various nationalist parties emerged—a Flemish one in 1954 and two French-language parties in the 1960s. Eventually the three traditional parties—the Social Christians, the Liberals, and the Socialists—each split along linguistic lines, rendering the political decision-making process increasingly complicated.
The policy of the postwar Belgian governments, apart from the “royal question” settled in 1951, was dominated by five major issues: consolidation of the mixed economy, the ideological controversy concerning education, the process of decolonization, the matter of language and regional autonomy, and Belgium’s role in the new postwar supranational organizations. In 1948 Belgium joined with the Netherlands and Luxembourg in the Benelux Economic Union, which had been conceived in 1944 in London. The country became a signatory of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) in 1949 and three years later joined the European Coal and Steel Community. In 1957 Belgium signed the Treaties of Rome, which it had helped to formulate, becoming a member of both the European Economic Community (later the European Community, which was embedded in and ultimately replaced by the European Union [EU]) and the European Atomic Energy Community.
During the late 1950s, growing opposition to colonial rule in the Belgian Congo led to large-scale demonstrations in Léopoldville. The Belgian government accelerated the process of political emancipation of its colonies, granting independence to the Congo (now the Democratic Republic of the Congo) in June 1960 and to Ruanda-Urundi (now the countries of Rwanda and Burundi) in July 1962.
The education controversy became critical once again in the second half of the 1950s. The Socialist-Liberal coalition simultaneously cut subsidies to private (mainly Catholic) secondary schools and promoted a major extension of the state’s secondary education system. After the defeat of the Socialists and Liberals in the 1958 election, a “School Pact” was signed under the initiative of the new Social Christian prime minister, Gaston Eyskens. This compromise measure, which authorized extension of the state secondary schools while guaranteeing conditional state subsidies for their private counterparts, marked the onset of an enduring ideological pacification in the country.
Following the “miracle recovery” of the late 1940s, Belgium’s economic surge subsided. The consolidation of the mixed economy, aimed at linking economic growth with a more equitable distribution of income and with an increase in the supply of public goods and social benefits, had been successful, but at the cost of rising wages and a heavier tax burden. Continued reliance on the aging Walloon heavy industry, coupled with a declining investment rate, seriously compromised the competitive power of the Belgian economy, reducing its growth rate to a level near that of Britain’s.
Participation in the European customs union from 1958 gradually reversed the unfavourable economic trend by enlarging the market for Belgian products. An explicit expansion policy by the government was also a contributing factor. Prime Minister Eyskens reformed the state finances and launched an active policy of regional economic development in 1959. The Flemish sector, unencumbered by the rigid industrial structure that characterized Wallonia, attracted foreign investment on a large scale from the United States, from Belgium’s European Community partners, and subsequently from Japan. Meanwhile, it was generous state subsidies that kept Walloon heavy industry alive.
The growing economic disparity between the two regions intensified dissatisfaction with the unitary state system. The Flemings opposed subsidizing an ailing regional economy that lacked any prospect of structural industrial reform. The Walloons, in turn, feared that the more numerous and prosperous Flemings would soon dominate the state. Linguistic and economic tensions were now inextricable. As a consequence of massive strikes in Wallonia in early 1961, an immovable linguistic border was defined by an act of parliament in 1962–63, and a new special arrangement was elaborated for the bilingual area around Brussels.
Federalized Belgium
After tensions led to the division of the still bilingual University of Louvain into a Flemish-speaking campus on Flemish territory and a French-speaking campus on Walloon territory in 1969–70, a slow but definitive process of federalization got under way. The parliament accorded cultural autonomy to the Flemish and Walloon regions in 1971. A revision of the constitution nine years later allowed for the creation of an independent administration within each region. Another revision of the constitution in 1988–89 extended regional autonomy to encompass the economy and education. It also gave the bilingual metropolitan area of Brussels the status of a third independent region with its own administration and changed Belgium explicitly into a federal state. This transformation was finalized with the St. Michael’s Agreement (September 1992), which also called for the division of Brabant into two provinces (Flemish Brabant and Walloon Brabant).
The acceleration of the federalization process during the 1980s was influenced to a large extent by economic factors. The oil crises of 1973 and 1979–80 and the ensuing world recession stunned Belgium’s decidedly open economy. A coalition government formed in 1981 by the Liberals and the Social Christians pursued a program of restrictive monetarism and structural reform: the Belgian franc was devalued (1982), and the increase in the money supply was brought under control by cutting public services and by ending governmental subsidies to the old industries. Within three years Belgian industry had regained its competitiveness, owing to a combination of government policy, improvement in the world economy, and the dynamism of Europe as it moved toward a more complete economic unification.
King Baudouin, who played a role in maintaining national unity by pacifying the contentious Flemish- and French-speaking communities, died on July 31, 1993. He was succeeded by his brother, Albert II. During the 1990s, Belgium continued to struggle with its so-called language problem. Struggles over the nature and form of power devolution to language regions and communities attracted significant attention, and the federalization of so many aspects of Belgian political and social life promoted linguistic regionalism. Some even began to question whether Belgium can or should remain a single state.
At the same time, Belgium’s immigrant population grew during the 1990s—bolstered by an influx of refugees, first from unrest in Bosnia and then from that in Kosovo. There was evidence of growing social tension related to this influx, and during the early 1990s anti-immigrant groups gained greater support—only to see that support fade somewhat by the end of the decade. Indeed, in 2000 the Belgian government offered an amnesty to illegal immigrants who had resided in Belgium for a minimum number of years. Moreover, in 2006 a large demonstration against racism in Antwerp, prompted by the murder in May of a Malian nanny and a Belgian toddler, revealed the dedication of many Belgians to a multicultural society.
Several laws passed in the early 21st century further reflected reformist attitudes. Gay marriage became legal; same-sex couples were permitted to adopt children; the private use of cannabis was decriminalized; and euthanasia was legalized.
The central role of Belgium (particularly Brussels) in the European unity project became more apparent, with massive urban renewal projects initiated in Brussels to make room for the expanding EU administrative corps. Brussels increasingly has assumed the role of administrative “Capital of Europe,” giving that city a special role in international affairs and providing an antidote to the growing internal fragmentation of Belgium itself. In the process, Belgians tended to define their interests increasingly in international terms.Herman F.A. Van der WeeEmiel L. LambertsJan Maria Juul MaternéLeen Van MolleAlexander B. Murphy
In 2007 the continued existence of a federalized Belgium was called into question after the Flemish Christian Democrats, victors in the June parliamentary elections, failed to form a governing coalition. After six months of political deadlock that threatened to end in the breakup of the country, King Albert II asked caretaker prime minister Guy Verhofstadt, head of the defeated Flemish Liberals and Democrats, to form an interim government. A new coalition government, made up of five French- and Flemish-speaking parties and led by the Flemish Christian Democrat Yves Leterme, finally took power in March 2008.
Leterme pledged to increase the governmental powers of the country’s regions but was met with resistance from French-speaking parties, who saw the reforms as more beneficial to Flanders than to Wallonia. In July of that year Leterme offered to step down as prime minister, but the king rejected the resignation. Political turmoil—fueled by allegations of the government’s questionable involvement in the bailout and sale of the Belgian portion of a financial firm—continued through the end of 2008.
In December Leterme resigned, and Herman Van Rompuy, a fellow Flemish Christian Democrat respected for his skills as a mediator, replaced him as prime minister. Van Rompuy’s term was short-lived; in November 2009 he was named the first president of the EU’s European Council. Compelled to fill the post of prime minister yet again, King Albert nominated Leterme, who began his second term—what some called a second chance—on November 25, 2009. Not five months later, on April 22, 2010, Leterme tendered his resignation once again, following the withdrawal of the Flemish Liberals and Democrats from the governing coalition.
In the election that followed in June 2010, the big winners were the separatist New Flemish Alliance, which finished first with 27 seats (a gain of 19 seats), and the French-speaking Socialists, who added 6 seats to reach a total of 26 seats. The various parties were unable to come to an agreement as coalition talks continued for more than a year while Leterme oversaw a caretaker administration. In the meantime, some Belgians wryly took solace in their country’s capture of the modern world record for the number of days spent without a formal government. Despite having no formal government, in July 2011 Belgium became the second country in the EU to approve legislation that outlawed face coverings such as the Islamic veil.
After some 530 days without a government, Belgium was drawn into the debt crisis that had plagued other parts of Europe since 2009. In November 2011 the ratings agency Standard & Poor’s downgraded Belgium’s credit and confirmed a negative economic outlook for the country. Given the length of the political deadlock, lawmakers responded with surprising haste to that development. During a week of intense negotiations, a grand coalition of Christian Democrats, Liberals, and Socialists took shape, with Socialist Elio Di Rupo at its head. A career politician, Di Rupo had built a reputation as a talented negotiator. He was sworn in on December 6, 2011, becoming Belgium’s first Socialist prime minister since 1974, its first Francophone prime minister in more than three decades, and the EU’s first openly gay head of government. Later that month, the country was stunned when an ex-convict launched an attack on a crowded city square in Liège. Using grenades and an assault rifle, he killed at least three people and wounded dozens of others before taking his own life.
Di Rupo presided over a period of relative stability, as Belgium weathered the euro-zone debt crisis far better than a number of its fellow EU member countries. The tension between the country’s north and south remained, however, and the New Flemish Alliance polled strongly in local elections in Flanders in October 2012, with party leader Bart De Wever becoming mayor of Antwerp. In July 2013 Albert II, who had represented a significant unifying force throughout his reign, abdicated in favour of his son Philippe.