Talk:Partition of Belgium

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Partition of Belgium has had a peer review by Wikipedia editors which is now archived. It may contain ideas you can use to improve this article.

Partition of Belgium has had a peer review by Wikipedia editors which is now archived. It may contain ideas you can use to improve this article.

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A fact from Partition of Belgium appeared on Wikipedia's Main Page in the Did you know? column on 29 September 2007.

Contents 1 Possible consequences 2 % in favor of partition 3 Political parties 4 Concerns over neutrality 5 "Explicitly opposed" 6 Neighbours 7 Some remarks

[edit] Possible consequences

Perhaps we should try to add a section on the possible consequences of Flemish independence or the partition of Belgium in the current context. A number of newspapers published articles on what the consequences of an independent Flanders would be with regard to EU membership, etc. I think we can use those articles as a source of information.--Ganchelkas 10:04, 5 October 2007 (UTC)

I agree - as much information as is relevant. However, I would warn against turning to opinions and speculation about stuff that hasn't happened yet, or there isn't any practical process going on. K a r n a 11:14, 5 October 2007 (UTC)

Aye, I agree with both of you. —Nightstallion 12:00, 5 October 2007 (UTC)

--Has anything been said about Brussels, and its officially-bilingual status (as well as its rather-unique status in EU affairs)? Right now this is just speculation on my part, but should Flanders and Wallonia become independent countries in the European Union --or part of the Netherlands and France, respectively--, could Brussels become sort-of a modern day Danzig? Could it cease being the seat of government of any particular country, and assume a full-time role as the seat of government for Europe as a whole? (Like the "Distrito Federal" of either Brazil or Mexico, or the "District of Columbia" in America?) --At any rate, I agree that only relevant information should be included, and NO original research. Pine 00:28, 9 October 2007 (UTC)

Brussels has been noted as a factor in the issue, but right now its all speculation that must be avoided, as it is not really information, just conjecture. K a r n a 00:01, 12 October 2007 (UTC)

Brussels is majority French speaking, so i guess it will become a part of Wallonie or France instead of an independent country. But it depends on the negotiations in the future. If the Dutch want to secede from Belgium, than the French will have the best starting position for negotiations, because they want Belgium to continue functioning. (I hope Belgium remains a country. A partiton can have serious consequences for my country, Holland).Daanschr 15:50, 12 November 2007 (UTC)

I sure wouldn't count on Flanders becoming a part of Holland, Holland will become a part of Flanders "Resistance Is Futile. You Will Be Assimilated!" Borg (Star Trek)  ;-) ;-) ;-) JurgenG (talk) 09:34, 21 November 2007 (UTC)

Ho ho, this has become a very nice article. When I started it, I didn't know anything about writing a thorough article, but this seems to have covered the bases, and covered the important developments. My thanks to everybody who made this article so good. K a r n a 06:21, 15 November 2007 (UTC)

A great article indeed, congratulations! Maybe you guys from out of our country understand better what happens here than we do... JurgenG (talk) 09:34, 21 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit]  % in favor of partition

The number needs a reference. I heard about 10% or so. SA mtm (talk) 16:01, 22 November 2007 (UTC)

It depends on the type of poll. There were polls that just asked whether Flanders would be better off independent (which generated a result of more than 40% in favour) and polls that asked what the political future of Belgium should be and gave more than two options (which generated a result of about 10% in favour of partioning Belgium). I'll see whether I can find a reference for some of the surveys that have been conducted in this period. --Ganchelkas (talk) 17:02, 22 November 2007 (UTC)

I've already found one: België moet blijven, maar niet zoals nu. I don't know whether you can access it, it's possible that you need a subscription. Anyway, it says 12% of the Flemings want the end of Belgium, 37% wants more responsibilities for the communities and regions, 23% favours the status quo, 6% wants less responsibilities for the communities and regions and 15% wants to return to the unitary state.--Ganchelkas (talk) 17:12, 22 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Political parties

While I agree with Karna's opinion that the former section on political parties was more a bullet list than a correct article section, I think it should not have been deleted but expanded. The relative weights of these parties shows qualitatively the importance of the topic in the current political debatre. Their opinion with respect to the practical realization of an hypothetical partition of Belgium (e.g. whether Brussels should belong to Walonia or to Flanders) give an idea of the current possible alternatives. I think also a short description of the reasons why those parties promote or not the partition of Belgium should be included as well as an historical analysis of their electoral success. The opinion of the parties which do not have a clear position with respect to an eventual partitioning should also be analyzed and references with extracts of their manifestos or political programms. Vb 11:59, 26 November 2007 (UTC)

Of course, I agree with your points - I think that political parties may need a new section or simply expansion inside existing sections - feel free to do so. I've started to try to make this article an WP:FA, which means that I must follow FA guidelines. A peer review has begun above - please do help me with this with your feedback. K a r n a (talk) 15:50, 26 November 2007 (UTC)

OK. I therefore restore the paragraph. Vb10:59, 27 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Concerns over neutrality

I'm a bit worried by the tone of the article. This could be just my impression, but I think it contains certain statements that aren't entirely NPOV and that may be biased towards Flemish nationalism. This may be due to the fact that a lot of articles on the English Wikipedia have the same or similar problems. Some examples: Saying that it was the Walloons who revolted against the Dutch is not neutral. For every historian who claims so, you can find one who claims the opposite, it's a controversial issue. Saying that there's historical continuity with, respectively, France and the Netherlands, in my view, implies that the north of Belgium was ruled by the Dutch and the south by the French, which isn't the case. The whole of the Southern Netherlands (with the exception of the Prince-Bishopric of Liège) have been ruled by the the same leader since Philip the Good. I also don't think it's a good idea to rely on the Brussels Journal, an openly separatist website, for information as the information provided by it is likely to be POV. These are just some concerns I have.--Ganchelkas (talk) 17:12, 26 November 2007 (UTC)

I did not know that Brussels Journal was a biased source. I will fix that problem very soon - I too feel that whenever I read a passage, it comes across as if Belgium's partition is obvious. I don't know how to correct it, but as Spawn Man suggests that a complete rewrite is in order, I will do my best to solve the problem. K a r n a (talk) 17:28, 26 November 2007 (UTC)

I share exactly the same concerns as Ganchelkas. Citing the King is always difficult because it is a tradition in Belgium that the King's private talks may not be published. When the King gives a talk this is always a private talk or an official talk which must be co-signed by a minister. Vb 10:56, 27 November 2007 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 84.175.254.117 (talk)

[edit] "Explicitly opposed"

I think we should expand the section on parties opposed to the partition of Belgium to also include, for instance, parties that don't want the end of Belgium, but want more autonomy for the regions. I've taken the liberty of drafting a small bit on the stance of SP.A, Open Vld and Groen!:

The Socialist Party – Different (SP.A), the Flemish socialist party, states on its website that it believes an independent Flanders is not necessary. It does support the devolution of a number of additional responsibilities, such as the railways or the policy of employment. SP.A currently has 20 seats in the Flemish Parliament, 14 seats in the Belgian Chamber of Representatives and 4 seats in the Belgian Senate.

Open Vld, the Flemish liberals, wants more socio-economic and financial autonomy for Flanders, a homogenous division of responsibilities, more cooperation between the communities and regions and a strong federal state. Open Vld currently has 25 seats in the Flemish Parliament, 18 seats in the Chamber of Representatives and 9 seats in the Senate.

Groen!, the Flemish green party, wants another round in the state reform, but only if it leads to more solidarity, a better functioning of the institutions and more democracy. It states on its website that it doesn’t want to reform for the purpose of reforming. Groen! wants Belgium to remain a federal state and considers the cooperation between different communities within one state to be a challenge rather than a problem. It also pleas for federal loyalty and respect for the rulings of the Constitutional Court and wants to realise a more homogenous division of responsibilities. Groen! currently has 6 seats in the Flemish Parliament, 4 seats in the Chamber of Representatives and 2 seats in the Senate.

This still needs some work, improvement and elaborating though.--Ganchelkas (talk) 14:28, 28 November 2007 (UTC)

I agree with Ganchelkas' idea. Here is a cut out of the homepage of the PS:

Il faudra notamment répéter ensemble, entre francophones, que nous sommes opposés à toute scission de la sécurité sociale dans toutes ses branches (soins de santé, allocations familiales, etc.). Il faudra aussi répéter notre volonté d’élargir la Région de Bruxelles-Capitale afin notamment de donner un territoire qui relie directement la Wallonie à Bruxelles.[Transl:We, the Francophones, will all together have to insist on the fact that we are opposed to any regionalization of the welfare state in all of its components (healthcare, child benefit, etc.). We will also have to reiterate our will to expand the territory of the Brussels-Capital Region, in order to obtain among other things a territorial link between Walonia and Brussels.]

url=http://www.ps.be/Source/PageContent.aspx?ParentID=1282&MenID=4833&EntID=1 title=Communiqué de presse - 26.11.2007 publisher=Parti Socialist

Vb16:06, 29 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Neighbours

Might be useful to include how the Netherlands and France react to all this. Are there polticians there in favour of annexing areas speaking their language? Or do they tend to stay neutral? Indisciplined (talk) 18:54, 20 March 2008 (UTC)

I don't know about the Netherlands, but in France the official line is to support Belgian unity, not secession (for either group). See here (I'm afraid it's in French):

http://www.liberation.fr/actualite/monde/298169.FR.php "Sarkozy soutient l'unité"

http://www.liberation.fr/actualite/monde/made_in_belgique/294272.FR.php "L'inquiétude des voisins français"

There is also an interesting article here where a deputy from Brussels advocates reunion with France on a partnership basis akin to the relationship between France and French Polynesia. I don't know how seriously this man's ideas are taken in Belgium, however it says at the end of the article that he is heading to Paris to discuss this project with French politicians. In any case this article could be useful for the "citations needed" paragraph right at the beginning of this wikipedia article.

http://www.liberation.fr/actualite/monde/298173.FR.php "L’appel à une Belgique française"

I hope these can be of help. Jarby (talk) 12:49, 28 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Some remarks

With all due respect for the hard work done by the editors, some parts of this article seem either a bit POV or in any case, unclear.

• The communities remain segregated in linguistically-dominated provinces, while the minorities are disenfranchised in local government and services.

disenfranchised: could be wrongly interpreted: for instance, French-speaking political parties are allowed anywhere in Flanders, but they have to be local, i.e., from Flanders. Walloon or Brussels' politicians indeed can't get votes in the separate region of Flanders (with the exception of Brussels-Halle-Vilvoorde).

• Elections and national governments are dominated by coalitions of local and ethnic political parties.

What is meant by this? To form a national government coalitions have to be made between parties of both communities, not only local...

• (...) strong national institutions and the geopolitical importance of the multicultural Brussels serving as unifying elements.

What are those strong national institutions?

• Total Dutch speakers are 6.23 million, concentrated in the northern Flanders region, while French speakers comprise 3.32 million in Wallonia and an estimated 0.87 million or 85% of the officially bilingual Brussels-Capital Region.

The number of (native) French speakers in Brussels is blown up, see Brussels#Languages.

• The city has strong economical ties with surrounding Flanders meaning many Dutch-speakers commute to Brussels for work, but in return, the expanding suburbs of Brussels have created some French-speaking majority areas in Flanders.

The facts are definitaly correct, but I don't understand the link between the two: in return makes it seem as if the French speakers were annoyed by the daily commuting from Flanders and therefore, in revenge, moved to Flanders...

• While the N-VA seeks greater autonomy and favours the independence of Flanders,[14] the Vlaams Belang is openly separatist.

The N-VA is definitely openly separatist as well, so that's rather a common feature than a difference with Vlaams Belang. Either the word while, ... was a bad choice, or the author consideres being openly separatist —even in a democratic way— to be pestiferous.

• These citizens would see their rights as French-speakers assured by becoming part of the bilingual, French-dominated capital. In contrast, the Dutch-speakers in this rim zone would see their linguistical rights being endangered if incorporated into the Brussels region.

Both assured and endangered have an exaggerated negative connotation.

• The Mouvement Réformateur, the Francophone Liberal party, stresses in its manifesto that the Flemings are intending to split most of the solidarity mechanisms between the Belgians. They also state that they minimize the importance of the Brussels-Capital Region as an constitutional component of the federal state.

That's what the MR says, but it is quoted here as if the MR were to be right (which would be, obviously, contested in Flanders).

While being aware of my own language imperfection, I do notice that the English in the text contains numerous mistakes and that the spelling is inconsistent (UK-US). But, I repeat: a very good attempt to describe this chaos. Hopefully these remarks will help to make the article a bit more neutral than it already is. Kind regards, --Hooiwind (talk) 19:40, 21 May 2008 (UTC)