The Belgian divide

I apologize that it's taken me this long to get this post published, after promising it more than ten days ago. It's a complex subject, so composing my thoughts into a post that wouldn't turn into a long and boring lecture was quite a challenge. Let's hope I've succeeded - here goes!

As one might expect, since moving here we've learned a lot of things about Belgium that we didn't know before, and the politics of the country have been particularly interesting. Although I've known for some time that Belgium was a multilingual country, I truly had no idea that the divisions ran so much deeper than that.

The country is composed of two main cultural groups: the Flemish in the north, who are Dutch speaking and comprise about 59% of the citizen population, and the Walloons in the south, French speaking and about 40% of the population. A small number of German speakers live in the eastern part of the country, and Brussels is officially bilingual and also has a large number of non-citizen residents who speak a myriad of mother tongues. The country was only established in 1831, and so while the two groups have lived side by side for centuries, they have only shared a government for the past 175 years or so - not very long when you consider the length of European history!

On the surface the two groups have a lot in common; the majority share the same religion (Roman Catholicism) and a similar history of domination by other groups (Romans, Hapsburgs, etc.). They also share credit for many of the things for which Belgium is known - chocolate, great beer, and of course Belgian waffles (though the way they're prepared differs between the regions). It really is a place where north meets south in terms of western European culture, and the result is quite intriguing.

However, in a lot of ways they live completely separate lives; within Brussels, for instance, the comunities operate separate schools, so even Flemish and Wallonian children living in the same neighborhood do not go to school together. The political parties also operate completely separately according to language, adding even further to the divide and making political progress slow and painful. The Flemish economy has also been significantly stronger than Wallonia's in recent decades, and many Flemish are increasingly frustrated at what they see as forced subsidization of the Walloons on their part. Lastly, the Flemish tend to be more free-market oriented, while generally speaking the Walloons have stronger socialist leanings. The result is a host of political differences and few areas of agreement.

So what does this mean for the future of Belgium? At several points in recent history (including now) these divisions, and smaller political arguments resulting from the underlying resentment and separatism, have threatened the existence of the country. The latest crisis (which has essentially shut down the national government entirely) has been going on for over 150 days since the June 2007 elections. Thus far there are few signs of progress towards a resolution, and I'm seeing more and more news articles begin to consider the split-up of the country as a real possibility. On the other hand, since we arrived here we've seen an impressive number of Belgian flags flying from windows and balconies throughout the city in a show of citizen solidarity, so it's really hard to say what's going to happen. An 11th hour compromise is a possibility, but from what I can see it certainly won't come easily.

One final observation: I'm quite surprised at the complete lack of coverage of this situation by the U.S. media. On my recent visit to the States I watched a lot of news programs, and I constantly monitor several American news websites from here...and I have yet to see even a single mention of it! It's rather disappointing that I can get multiple daily updates on the Britney Spears trainwreck, but not one word about a major political crisis affecting the country that hosts not only the EU government, but the NATO headquarters, of which the United States is a key member. It makes me wonder what else goes on in the world that we don't hear about? Sorry to go off on that tangent - I don't intend to turn this blog into a political soapbox, but I find it a little embarrassing that I was completely ignorant of this situation when we arrived here, and would likely still know nothing about it if I weren't living here. Kinda sad!