Vykintas Pugaèiauskas, 2000
Introduction
Belgium has sometimes been described as a unique example of federation (apart from the now non-existent Czechoslovakia) in terms of two features. On the level of popular perception, the country has already been “split” into two ethnic parts and the bulk of political activity is directed toward regional governments — not to the distant center with few competencies left. However, contrary to the always present fears of the final split-up, the national, or federal, dimension of politics has not entirely vanished and the central institutions still reinforce themselves and the notion of Belgium as the single entity on the European arena.
The existence of the, however limited, central government is retained due to a number of reasons, but the influence of the party system on a federal level seems one of the most relevant explanations. The main Belgian political parties, although split into Flemish and Walloon organizations which are competing on a regional level, are still committed to the central government which, somewhat paradoxically, is the arena where regional political coalitions are also forged. Centrally based party elites have a more co-operative approach to national politics than the rank-and-file and the general public. This trend is apparent even in the case of regionalist parties, such as the Flemish Volksunie.
Thus it is possible to hypothesize that on a federal level, the Belgian party system resembles the cartel type where the party elites are successful in defending the “pillarized” format of the system from the challenges of ethnic centrifugalism. Stemming from this, one further suggestion would be that the rise of the anti-system parties (first and foremost, the Vlaams Blok) has to do with the protest against the established party system, not only with the radical attitudes towards immigrants and claims of further regional devolution or complete independence. These propositions do not mean that regional or linguistic differences do not matter. However, the party elites prefer to pacify this cleavage in the day-to-day politics and, major crises withstanding, to pursue “pillar-based” competition.
Exploring these hypotheses, I will attempt to explain not why Belgium has moved towards federalization and a possible break-up down the road, but why, given the centrifugal trends, it has survived as a single state. The explanations offered in this essay will be essentially institutional thus they do not pretend to be exhaustive or sufficient. I will proceed to define the cartel party and the cartel party system. Then I will discuss the structural base, the “pillars”, and the features of the Belgian party system with special regard to the party strategies of managing regionalist pressure on the central government and federal component of the party system. Finally, I will turn to the strongest case of Belgian anti-system party, the Vlaams Blok, and try to present the evidence that its popularity might be considered not so much as a sign of centrifugal dynamics as a protest against the national cartel of the major parties. I will use the terms “community” and “region” interchangeably referring to the two major linguistic entities, the Flemish region of Flanders and the Francophone region of Wallonia, unless noted otherwise.
1. The Cartel Party System
Drawing on the observation that “almost all substantial parties may now be regarded as governing parties” at one point in time or another, Katz and Mair have proposed that there is a new stage in the development of the party, “characterized by the interpenetration of party and state, and also by a pattern of interparty collusion”1 where none of the major parties “is ever definitively ’out’”. Their findings challenged the existing normative model of democracy since with the emergence of the cartel party “the essence of democracy lies in the ability of voters to choose from a fixed menu of political parties”2 which is provided by the party-populated state together with the provision of contested elections. Party survival hinges not so much on the electoral competition than on the ability of the parties to collectively use the state resources.
The features of the cartel party and the system are the pacts between the party elites, the diminishing importance of the electoral competition, the “managerialization” of political competition and the imbalance between ever increasing role of the autonomous central party apparatus and the decreasing role of local organizations. Drawing on the resources of the state they have become part of, cartel parties compete in a contained way, campaigning on the agreed goals and trying to minimize the effects of the defeat, not maximize their victory: “stability becomes more important than triumph; politics becomes a job rather than a vocation”3. Thus the cartel parties weaken their links with the general public and thus cannot prevent the emergence of outside challengers though they can effectively limit their appeal by institutional means.
Although Katz and Mair do not include Belgium in their list of countries where the emergence of cartel parties is most likely, the Belgian party system on a federal level exhibits many, if not most, features of their model. Drawing on this model, I will present the peculiarities of the pillarized cartel party system in Belgium which countervail the centrifugal trends. Unfortunately, I will have to use arbitrarily the notion of the “cartel party system” since Katz and Mair leave the very important concept of the system rather vague.4
2. The Structural Base of Belgian Party Politics
At the outset of its statehood, Belgium was once defined as a country where “there are parties and provinces but no nation”.5 Almost two centuries on, this definition still points out to the two main divisions of Belgian society: horizontal, or linguistic, and vertical (which, to be sure, started to take shape only in the late nineteenth century). Both of them interact in the arena of party politics and both deserve some special attention.
Vertical integration, or pillarization, was both a product and a determinant of some broad political pacts and the grand coalition government of late 1910s and early 1920s. With the national question still in the backstage, the two most important subcultures after the enfranchizement of the majority of the voters were Catholic and socialist, and the elite attempts to accommodate their interests prompted a process of internal integration. The Catholic pillar was a somewhat “looser” one, more an electoral alliance of its main subgroups than the coherent organization of the Christian labour movement with the four estates, the Christian farmers and the Christian middle classes.6 The Catholic Party, later renamed Christian Peoples Party/Social Christian Party (CVP/PSC), was a dominant but not a hegemonic player in the Catholic pillar especially as it expanded with additional functions of the welfare state.
The socialist pillar is less divided and, with no internal cleavages except the linguistic one, the parties — Social Democrats/the Socialist Party (BSP/PSB) — play a more central role in it. Welfare state has put its mark on the socialist pillar as well. The socialist pillar has also become the instrument of provision of state services and the vehicle for expressing the unions’ demands in the neo-corporatist arena. Beside the Catholic and the socialist pillars, there is the third pillar-like structure, namely the liberal pillar. Although there are some interest groups and service organizations associated with this pillar, the liberal parties — the Radical Liberals/Freedom Progress Party (conservative liberals) (PRL/PVV) — are the most important players since the pillar itself is not very strong both in numeric and political terms.
The study of vertical integration, or pillarization, is however inseparable from the horizontal, or linguistic, integration (ironically, both terms “integration” in the Belgian case might well be substituted with “separation”). Ever since the establishment of the unitary Belgian state in 1830s the linguistic differences — and, indeed, different cultures, Germanic and Latin,— have survived though the linguistic divide was acknowledged in early 1930s and officially recognized only in the mid-1960s with the constitutional amendments which demarcated Dutch- and French-speaking regions. Since these developments, the centrifugal trends have ever strengthened and reinforced themselves, culminating in the constitutional reform of 1993 which established the federal state and redistributed the Senate seats.
The pillarization has clearly been influenced by this “horizontal” divide. A 19th century industrial region, Wallonia has since declined both in terms of economic importance and relative share of its population. Not only has it not been able to successfully manage its “reconversion from a heavy industrial past”, but also the growth in the economic power of the Flanders area was no slower than this area’s demographic rise.7 The level of (post-)industrial development has arguably shaped the general political preferences in the two linguistic regions. Although parties of all three pillars have their supporters in the whole country, the Christian democrats are most widely supported in Flanders and the socialists in Wallonia. In addition, socialists in Wallonia are better organized than the Flemish Christian democrats, and accordingly there are differences in the internal integration of the pillars: loose in the case of the Catholic pillar and rather party-centered in the case of the socialist one.8 Furthermore, the party elites tended to reflect this asymmetry: the Christian democrats were never led by a Francophone nor the socialists by a Flemish.9 Thus to some extent the regional divide not cuts across but overlaps the pillar divide and the salient cleavages.10 The liberal parties in both regions come second or third and this relative weakness might account for the fact that, as it will be discussed later, they have chosen to adopt a somewhat anti-systemic rhetoric.
Thus the Belgian society is both horizontally and vertically divided. Each of the pillars and each language community are almost self-sufficient entities in the modern welfare state. The Belgian party system is even more fragmented (in addition to six unilingual parties representing the main pillars there are some regional and some post-materialist or anti-system parties), yet on the federal level it shows remarkable stability or at least ability to cope with the crises (though, as some would argue, mostly delaying the inevitable decisions). This is even more remarkable if we acknowledge that the linguistic cleavage has not historically been the only one — labour—capital and church—state cleavages have been salient as well while the new cleavages also emerge. I will argue that this relative stability of the Belgian party system might be explained in terms of cartel arrangements among the major parties but first I turn to the party behaviour during the most important changes of the cleavage system.
3. “Crisis Consociationalism” and Party Strategies
Consociational democracy is a model frequently used to describe Belgium’s political arrangements. However, grand coalition governments were rare and most of them were established during the two world wars. Otherwise, politics was rather majoritarian than consociational — though until the language conflicts reemerged in the early 1960s this was a majoritarianism more on socio-economic than linguistic or regional matters. Still some of the most important political decisions — the establishment of neo-corporatist system and the “school pact” which recognized the principle of segmental autonomy — were the products of consociational style of politics. Thus, as Deschouwer notes, “the adoption of consociational structures and techniques has historically occurred in the context of crisis management”.11
The outcome of such “crisis consociationalism” has been the removal of the major cleavage conflicts from the arena of popular politics and parliamentary debates to the more technical or, following the terminology of Katz and Mair, “managerialist”, spheres — be it negotiations under neo-corporatist arrangements or the complex system of guarantees of religious education — where the parties could exercise their strength and employ their relations with other pillar organizations. Yet these cartel effects were more distant in time compared to the instant reemergence of another salient cleavage, namely the regional divide. The economic growth of Flanders was seen by the Walloon community as a sign of the Flemish majority extending state support and investment to the Flemish regions. Growing Flemish economic power and Walloon dissatisfaction have prompted the Centre Harmel, a special research center, to propose granting cultural autonomy and imposing equivalence between cultural and territorial divisions. This was done in the linguistic laws of 1962—1963 and the revisions of 1970 which introduced the concepts of culturally-based Communauté and territorially-based Région.
This had new implications for the party politics. The most important one was the emergence and growth of the regionalist parties. The Flemish Volksunie (VU), although tracing its origins back to the late 1910s, has reached its peak of popularity in the 1960s and especially in the elections of 1971, when 11 of its candidates were elected to the parliament. Two Walloon parties, the Rassemblement Wallon (RW) and the Brussels-based Front Démocratique des Francophones (FDF), were created in the mid-1960s out of small political parties and interest associations united by the aims of Walloon autonomy and the protection of the French-speaking inhabitants of Brussels. Their popularity has also risen sharply in late 1960s and early 1970s. Eventually, they were also included in the system of “crisis consociationalism” and have participated in the 1977—1978 and 1978—1979 governments that paved the way for the next round of constitutional revisions which awarded territorial autonomy to the Régions and extended the responsibilities of the Communautés. Later some of the regional parties have, although somewhat reluctantly, participated in the coalition governments of 1987—1991 and indirectly in 1993.
However, the major impact of the regional division on the party system was not the emergence of the regionalist parties but the reaction of the pillar parties to this development. The Christian democrats, liberals and socialists have also split into regional parties and organized themselves along the territorial cleavage. To be sure, the Christian democrats had two rather separate linguistic wings prior to their split in the 1969 which appointed two “wing-presidents”, but the developments in the late 1960s prompted a more radical approach if the party was to retain its electorate12. The liberals followed suit in 1971, and on the same year the socialists have changed their internal structure to have two national co-presidents from the two linguistic regions instead of national president and vice-president belonging to different communities. However, this did not prevent the socialists from a full split into independent territorial parties in 1978. As Keman notes, these developments were “typically a strategy to limit the electoral room for manœuvre of territorially based parties in Flanders (VU) and Wallonia (FDF/RW) in order to maintain their electoral share and thus uphold their own position within the changing party system”.13 The success of this strategy might explain the persistence of the pillar parties.
4. The Persistence of the Pillar Parties: A Cartel
Recognizing the proposition of Keman that “it is no exaggeration to suggest that today two party systems exist in Belgium, representing the party families in separate ideological blocs in Wallonia and Flanders”14, this part of the essay will deal mostly with the third component — the interactions between these two party systems on a federal level, a party system of its own. To be sure, the concept of a federal party system in Belgium is artificial since there are no more federal parties. The salient issues of party competition and the need for greater responsiveness on the regional level force Flemish and Walloon parties to demand further regional competencies at the expense of the center.
Still there is the constitutional commitment of power sharing on the federal level, and the parties across the regional cleavage are pushed to finally arrive at the agreement and install a working coalition if there is to be a federal government at all. Thus the need for agreement is externally enforced but the parties (or, rather, party elites) have accommodated themselves to this system. Though the unity of the parties is reinforced by “[c]asting conflicts … in terms of a Flemish—Francophone confrontation”,15 the parties recognize the need to campaign on the salient issues in the way that would not preclude their later cooperation in the government. One other dimension of this game is the need to be responsive to electoral demands on a regional level yet consensus-oriented on a federal one. Thus “adversarial politics” during the election campaigns renders its way to the “coalescent behaviour” when it comes to coalition formation. The lack of collective responsibility by the government members for the actions of the Council of Ministers and mutual checks and veto powers by the representatives of the linguistic communities increase the need for consensus and party accommodation if the central governments are to survive.
Indeed, the language divide of the pillar parties has understandably become the burden on the coalition making but not something that parties have not managed to overcome. Ever since the split, the coalition governments have been formed with every two pillar parties from both linguistic regions remaining together either in the government or the opposition, producing the image of oversized coalitions.16 While the two pillar counterparts have not acted as single entities, this has reinforced the relative importance of pillarization as opposed to linguistic divide. True, most governments have fallen over the regional conflicts, but then again, they were usually succeeded by the carefully crafted coalitions of the same parties, sometimes even led by the same prime ministers. Since such coalitions are constructed through a number of detailed arrangements, the party leadership and the government ministers expect that their parliamentary parties will stick to these arrangements and keep the consensus. This reinforces the dominant position of the party leadership and reduces that of the parliament. The analysis of the procedures of nomination and approval of party presidents by De Winter further indicates that the wider party institutes are mere rubber-stamps on the choices of the party elites.17
In other words, party elites — those having to deal with the other language group on a daily basis and most aware of the need for the survival of the federal level of government — have the upper hand in the political process. There are more indications that the linguistic cleavage has not become a matter of popular mobilization or antagonism inside the two communities but rather a dispute “between elected and non-elected party officials, with some interventions from the media and from interest-group leaders”.18 The elected members of the parliament feel most acutely the pressure towards further devolution since the members of the federal parliament sit also in the regional councils. However their “centrifugal” influence is somewhat pacified by the need of the federal legislature to follow the executive pacts reached in the subtle deliberations of the party elites. As noted by Keman, the parties are less likely (at least when compared to other Benelux countries) to give up coalitions than their policy objectives and once the coalition agreement has been reached the party leaders have some room to manœuvre and deviate from the government program.19 Thus in the conditions of the institutional structure allowing for the formal non-cooperation between the representatives of the linguistic regions, a way out of looming paralysis depends on the mastery of the political leaders.
Although the relative weight of the pillar parties, especially the Christian democrats (and especially the Flemish Christian democrats), has been declining, and the party system fragmentation increased, the two pillar party families have remained the (almost) exclusive players as the government coalitions were formed by the Christian democrats and socialists.20 This has produced consistent expectations which if nothing else further reinforce the established pattern of coalition formation. The parties, especially the (Flemish) Christian democrats have therefore retained their influence not on the electoral arena but inside the structures of the pillarized provision of services (in the words of Deschouwer, output-oriented rather than mobilization-oriented). The pillar parties, constantly participating in the governments, guarantee that their pillar organizations survive. The main instrument of this continuing integration is personnel recruitment and promotion. In this area, the pillar parties act as a real cartel. The parties that have reached a coalition agreement distribute various patronage positions among themselves yet the parties that are excluded from the particular coalition pact retain the opportunity to “make up” in the future governments.
Though all three party families have been engaged in this kind of patronage, the “natural” type of coalition has become the center-left government whereas the third pillar party, the liberals, has been effectively pushed out of the federal executive. Not only the two major parties — the Christian democrats and the socialists — have been permanent partners in the coalition governments for the last three decades but they have also been the major parties in their respective linguistic regions, Flanders and Wallonia. Yet the most important effect of this sidelining of the liberals has been the symmetry of coalitions in both regions. Since there are no independent legislatures in Flanders and Wallonia, the federal coalitions are “imposed” on the regions. Thus the governing Christian-democratic and socialist coalitions in the center were replicated in the regions by the regional Christian-democratic and socialist coalitions. There are two related conclusions to be reached from this. First, the real coalition building game still is the prerogative of the central party elites and second, the autonomy of the regional pillar parties and the regions themselves is reduced.
These features of the party system may also explain the relative unimportance of the regionalist parties. In Flanders, the Volksunie even in its most successful election in 1971 has surpassed only the third party, the liberals. It has been declining since then, partly due to the attempts to become a multi-issue party yet constant changes on the left—right and other dimensions21, partly due to the fact that it was not able to create its own pillar-like structure, partly due to factional in-fighting, and partly due to the increase in the “Belgicist”, as opposed to nationalist, feelings.22 However, the “external factor” seems one of the most relevant explanations as the rise of the VU might be related to its exclusiveness in defending the communal interests while its decline with the pillar party response.
The fortunes of the Rassemblement Walloon have risen even more dramatically in the critical election of 1971 when in Wallonia it overtook even the second pillar party, the Christian democrats. Yet in 1985 it was reduced to irrelevant party, which has gained only 0.6 per cent of the votes.23 While the common “anti-Flemish” sentiment may have won the party most of its votes, the split and the departure of its charismatic leader left the RW on the grounds of much stronger Walloon socialists that were able to capture the RW electorate after the split. The Front Démocratique des Francophones, a party of Brussels Francophones, by contrast, has been more successful on the electoral arena, partly due to its alliance with the liberals. It has adopted cooperative strategy and has thus been able to push some of its requirements by participating in the governing coalitions both at regional and central levels. Yet these regional parties, no matter how irrelevant they are judging by the present party system standards, have prompted the pillar parties to take the steps toward regionalization and federalization of the state and therefore at least partly achieved their goals.
The Belgium party system, especially the interaction of parties on a federal level, has the main features of the cartel model. Though the parties (rarely!) alternate in the government, they are rather irresponsive on the federal level to electoral preferences. The role of the party leadership is very important while that of the local organizations is insignificant. The parties use the resources of the state, mainly the government posts and financial assistance to the underdeveloped regions, to reward their loyalists and enhance their appeal. Their competition, rather adversarial on the electoral arena, is contained in the government coalitions with behind-the-scenes executive pacts reducing the relative importance of parliamentary debates. This mode of the pillar party particratie could not remain unchallenged.
5. The Challengers: The Vlaams Blok
The cartel model of the Belgian partitocracy was first criticised by the liberal parties. As the other two pillar parties had their “own” regions (the socialists were established in Wallonia and the Christian democrats in Flanders) and have usually formed the “natural” coalitions, the liberal parties, coming second or third in both regions, for the most of the time have been excluded from participation in government and thus from its services. Having been pushed out of the system and reduced again to the “half” party they criticise the other two pillar party families for their cartel behaviour. They were joined by the Volksunie, the post-materialist parties such as the Greens and the anti-immigrant parties such as the Walloon Front National.
However, the most important challenge (at least in the electoral terms) to the party system came from the radical right wing party, the Vlaams Blok.24 As the Vlaams Blok was formed after the split of the Volksunie in 1978 when the radical Flemish nationalists defected to the newly established party, one would expect its appeal to be based on the claims of regional independence as well as its linguistic “purity”. Out of five major points of the 1991 campaign, one was complete independence of Flanders, one the return of non-European immigrants to their home countries and one the traditional requirement for “law and order”. It has also campaigned on populist protest issues such as anti-monopolism of established pillar organizations and “punishing the political Mafia”.25
Therefore it might be proposed that the VB has campaigned also on the issues of anti-partyism. Yet there is conceptual ambiguity about the classification of the Blok as a protest party or rather an anti-immigrant, racist or extreme-right one. Highlighting theoretical differences between these types of radical parties, Fennema classifies the VB as a protest party which is described by its “anti-party sentiment” and claims that “the political establishment represents a ‘sham democracy’”.26 Further conceptualizing the term “protest vote”, Van Der Brug, Fennema and Tillie put the VB into the “anti-immigrant” cell since the voter preference for this party is predicted by their negative attitude towards immigrants even though its separatist claim is more advanced.27 Yet the most extensive study of the electoral motives for voting for the VB by Billiet and De Witte has concluded that at least some part of the electorate has voted for the Blok out of feelings of protest and powerlessness.28 This, however, does not differentiate the electorate of the VB from the supporters of other radical or post materialist parties in Belgium. It might be concluded from their statistical survey that it is the anti-immigrant issues that are appealing for the voters and to some extent nationalist attitudes, not the radical right-wing stance of the Blok. Yet one more analysis points out that “[w]hereas Vlaams Blok can best be summarized as a culturally racist, separatist and authoritarian party of the ultra-right, for its electors it is at most a populist ethnocentric protest party”.29 Thus it remains unclear whether it is correct to classify the VB as a protest party, but the vote for the Blok should be seen as an anti-system vote at least for a part of its electorate — as is the case with the electorate of other parties outside the cartel.
Conclusions
Many explanations might account for the persistence of Belgium as a single state despite strong demands for decentralization. The impact of the party system is among relevant explanations. It was argued in this essay that the linguistic cleavage, although salient and even reinforcing other cleavages, has been pacified by the format of the party system on a federal level. The interaction of two party systems — Flemish and Walloon — in the central institutions resembles the cartel model where the major players are the pillar parties which use their networks to provide the resources of the state to the members of various pillar organizations.
The parties have thus differing incentives on the electoral and government arenas. In the former, they compete on the basis of the salient issues but do this as to not preclude their future cooperation in the government. The mode of cooperation, or Belgian consociationalism, is rather closed one where there is “natural” coalition of the Christian democrats and socialists expected. One important feature of these coalitions is their symmetry (as opposed to asymmetric strength — and asymmetric decline — of the two major parties in the linguistic regions) where the two regional parties of the same pillar join and leave the government together. These coalitions are then imposed on the regions thus pushing third parties out of cartel. Coalition pacts are carefully crafted by the central party elites and once they are reached the parliamentary parties are expected to follow them. The ministers still are considered as representatives of their respective regions and the party leadership is allowed to deviate from the coalition programs. The pattern of party organization and leadership selection further enhances the role of their central elites which are the most aware of the cooperation across the regional divide.
The main parties have in general successfully adopted the strategies that induced the decline of the regional parties. After the pillar parties split into distinct regional organizations and radicalized their regional appeal the main regional parties — VU, FDF and RW — have become irrelevant. Nevertheless it was their influence that prompted the major parties to take the steps towards federalization. Yet the party cartel was challenged by one of the pillar party families, the liberals, and, more drastically, by the largest anti-system party, the VB. Though its popularity might be explained first and foremost by its anti-immigrant stance, the VB is regarded by a part of its electorate as a protest party — like other parties outside of the pillar party cartel.
Thus it might be concluded that the pillar parties engage in the dual behaviour. They pursue the regionalist agenda on the electoral level and in the regional councils but have to participate in the consociational arrangements on the central level. This makes them central actors with regard to federalism and increases the dependence of politics along the federal—regional dependence on the position of party elites. While until recently this has been a device safeguarding against the split up of the state, this was largely due to the fact that the vertical pillars that cut across the horizontal linguistic divide remained important despite the relative decline of the pillar parties. Yet further decline of the parties might put the federal system at risk.
Notes
1 Katz R. S., Mair P. Changing models of party organization and party democracy: The emergence of the cartel party // Party politics.— 1995.— Vol. 1.— No. 1.— P. 16—17.
2 Ibid.— P. 21.
3 Ibid.— P. 23.
4 See Þeruolis D. Rytai tampa Vakarais? Vakarø Europos konceptualiniø instrumentø taikymo problemos pokomunistiniø partiniø sistemø stabilizacijos bei kaitos analizei // Politologija.— 1996.— Nr. 1.— P. 12—16.
5 Quoted in: Wagstaff P. Regionalism in Belgium // Europa: Regionalism in Europe / Ed. P. Wagstaff.— 1994.— Vol. 1.—No.2/3.—P. 41.
6 See Deschouwer K. From consociation to federation: How the Belgan parties won // Party elites in divided societies / Eds. K. R. Luther, K. Deschouwer.— London and New York, 1999.— P. 81—83.
7 Wagstaff P. Op. cit.— P. 46.
8 See Deschouwer K. Op. cit.— P. 81.
9 See De Winter L. The selection of the party presidents in Belgium: Rubber stamping the nominee of the party elites // European journal of political research.— 1993.— Vol. 24.— P. 250.
10 This was demonstrated in many areas not directly connected with linguistic matters such as fiscal policy of arms sales. For details, see Murphy A. Belgium’s regional divergence: Along the road to federation // Federalism: The multiethnic challenge / Ed. G. Smith.— London and New York, 1995.— P. 91—93.
11 Deschouwer K. Op. cit.— P. 80.
12 This was followed by the disastrous showing in the 1971 elections, where the new Wallon party, the PSC, has received only 20.1 per cent (see De Winter L. Op.cit.— P. 253.— Note 9) but later has managed to regain some of the lost votes notwithstanding the general decline of the Christian democratic parties.
13 Keman H. The Low countries: Confrontation and coalition in segmented societies // — P. 225.
14 Ibid.— P. 221; emphasis in the original.
15 Covell M. Belgium: The variability of ethnic relations / The politics of ethnic conflict regulation / Eds. J. McGarry and B. O’Leary.— London and New York, 1993.— P. 294.
16 See Keman H. Op.cit.— P. 227.
17 See De Winter L. Op. cit.— P. 233—256.
18 Covell M. Op. cit.— P. 293.
19 See Keman H. Op.cit.— P. 231—234.
20 According to the 1999 data, the Christian democratic parties have participated in all governments since 1958. Since the critical elections of 1961, the socialist parties have participated in all but six governments while their “alternative” — the liberals have been in power for only twelve years out of thirty-eight. See Deschouwer K. Op. cit.— P. 99 and Table 4.6 in p. 92.
21 See De Winter L. The Volksunie and the dilemma between policy success and the electoral survival in Flanders // Regionalist parties in Europe / Eds. L. De Winter, H. Türsan.— London and New York, 1997?.— P. 33—35.
22 Ibid.— P. 42. See also Murphy A. Op. cit.— P. 94.
23 See Buelens J., Van Dyck R. Regionalist parties in French-speaking Belgium: The Rassemblement Wallon an the Front Démocratique des Francophones // Regionalist parties in Europe / Eds. L. De Winter, H. Türsan.— London and New York, 1997?.— P. 52.— Table 4.1.
24 In the 1995 elections to the House of Representatives, the VB has gained 7.8 per cent and came fourth after the three pillar party families. See Deschouwer K. Op. cit.— P. 94.— Table 4.7.
25 See Billet J., De Witte H. Attitudinal dispositions to vote for a ‘new’ extreme right-wing party: The case of ‘Vlaams Blok’ // European journal of political research.— 1995.— Vol. 27.— No. 2.— P. 186—187.
26 Fennema M. Some conceptual issues and problems in the comparison of anti-immigrant parties in Western Europe // Party politics.— 1997.— Vol. 3.— No. 4.— P. 477.
27 See Van Der Brug W., Fennema M., Tillie J. Anti-immigrant parties in Europe: Ideological or protest vote? // European journal of political research.— 2000.— Vol. 37.— P. 77—102.
28 See Billet J., De Witte H. Op. cit.
29 Swyngedouw M., as quoted in Fennema M. Op. cit.— P. 499.
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