The Weekly Standard has an interesting piece on Belgium’s troubles in keeping itself together.
The second thing he insists on is that Americans may have an especially hard time seeing what is wrong with Belgian federalism as it now exists. With its already enormous devolutions of political authority to Flanders and Wallonia, Belgium now looks like the kind of federalism that American states’-rights advocates used to dream of. What needs to be remembered, he explains, is that the United States started as a loose confederation of independent states, which have slowly (and perhaps excessively) coalesced over the centuries. “We’re different,” he says. “We started as a unified nation-state and slowly but surely fell apart.”
The Belgian state, in fact, now has little to do. National responsibilities of the smaller kind–from road-building to education–have migrated downward to the regions. National responsibilities of a larger kind have migrated upward to the European Union. Belgium uses the euro. And although there is still no EU army, cash-strapped Brussels has decided to pretend there is. It recently announced the closure or downsizing of dozens of military bases.
One of the roots of Belgium’s instability is that it has seen one of the swiftest reversals of ruling class and subject class that modern history affords. In the early years of the Belgian state, French-speaking Walloons were top dog. They remained the country’s elite until well after the Second World War. The faded French shop signs you can see in certain old neighborhoods in Dutch-speaking Ghent are a lingering reminder of the time when a Fleming had to speak French to participate in national
life. Walloons almost never learned Dutch. Today the Dutch-speakers are rich and the French-speakers are poor, and the two generally communicate, if at all, in English.
I’m not sure which one above represents Flemish Belgium and which one is Wallonia and its Walloons in the south of Belgium, but suffice to say that Belgium is just such a coupling. I gave a lecture last year in my International law seminar about Belgium and their lack of a Constitution and the students were a bit shocked that NATO hosting, UN Peacekeeping booster Belgium was dysfunctional. They thought the EU was supposed to smooth over these disputes. Aren’t Belgians — when they weren’t supporting massive African slaughter, making Fat Tire lager, and sending us Jean Claude Van Damme supposed to be the people for peace and post-Westphalian bliss? Hell… they’re not even a “people”. They’re not even built around ideals. They are a relationship of convenience. I think having a country called “Wallonia” is great and the non-stop giggles of elementary school children (NOT in California) saying “Walloons” is just priceless.
On a more serious note… as long as there’s no shooting civil war, the decentralization of power back to more local autonomy can’t be a bad thing and there’s a great lesson in Belgium about free market policies (Flanders) vs. a unionized and heavily subsidized (read “unemployed”) economy (Wallonia).
I think the point of history also missed by the speaker talking about the American perspective of Belgium is that American states may have been distinct, but they also had a larger shared culture that suffused their distinct local cultures. At least as early as 1774, and maybe earlier, colonial literature refers to a singular America and refers to it as a nation. The conception existed before the polity.
It’s been a good decade since I worked there, but Belgium was one of my favorite foreign countries for overseas assignments. Beautiful towns, decent, friendly, multi-lingual citizens. Service was pretty decent too. They seemed to understand that it could be profitable to be nice to customers.
The dichotomy between the Dutch and French was striking, however. The amount of extra work even simple tasks took due to the language and cultural differences permeated everything and I did notice a superior attitude amongst the French speakers. The “Dutch” folks I worked with preferred to speak in French (it was a sign that one had attended University).
All in all an easy place to get around with charming scenery and friendly citizens but I always figured the rest of Europe would eventually overrun them, economically, because of all the inefficiency of having two (actually 3 when one counts the German speaking east) languages and cultures in such a tiny landmass.
David,
You are correct, and in that sense the U.S. is very different from Belgium. The U.S. had a bit of a mishmash of English, French and Spanish, and you still see those differences. Compare Boston to New Orleans to San Antonio, but we always tended towards one currency and one language. Belgians have intentiionally kept two (three) very distinct cultures going within their borders where, historically, Americans have always been willing to set aside culture in favor of economic efficiency.
…historically, Americans have always been willing to set aside culture in favor of economic efficiency.
Of course, Americans have always been proud of their local cultures, even as they were proud of their larger shared heritage.
Were we not intended to function more as independent states with a federal government that largely focused on common defense and international affairs? I know that was always a big argument between the Federalist and anti-Federalist but by in large our founding fathers were wise enough to realize states had different needs and no central government could meet them all. Thus the 10th Amendment.
Another problem with Europe that the article alludes to, but doesn’t quite state right out is that in Europe, nationalism and ethnicity go hand in hand. While the US has never really had that limitation.
Excellent point, Mighty Skip.
The “federalization” of Belgium was necessary because the lion’s share of the tax money from the productive north was being absorbed in the bureaucratic south. The French civil “servants” were ripping off the Dutch producers and it came very close to blowing the country apart. It’s too bad some of the people being ripped off in the US can’t get the same spirit of “We’re not going to take it any more” and do something about it.
Don’t know – if we do that “double dip” the coming trough might be low enough to force some massive splits.
Of course, it probably won’t be necessary as Congress will be about to change hands when/if this happens.
I’ve been to Belgium. Wasn’t the word “Eurotrash” coined about it?