O dierbaar België
Posted on 29. Sep, 2007 by Peter in Voor de dag
I was planning to write something about the so called political crisis here in Belgium, in the next few weeks after most of the fuzz would have faded. Unfortunately the end now seems further away then it was at the start of the negotiations so the idea of postponing this article becomes irrelevant.
It looks like the Belgian voters have made it almost impossible to create a government with a composition that respects the different communities and the outcome of the elections. Anyone ever heard of the Arrow’s impossibility theorem?
This negotiation is often called the most difficult in the history of Belgium. I suppose it is but there are many reasons for saying so. Firts of all the political landscape and political culture is totally different from for example the mid 80s. In addition, the media has become a true protagonist in this new formed landscape. They are everywhere and anytime. Secrets or secret negotiations are history because the almighty eye of the media never sleeps.
- Herman Van Rompuy giving an introductury course in politics
-
- NSV-students protesting against unitarist Belgium
These photos were taken tuesday during the indroductory course of Carl Devos’ “Politicologie” lessons. For the second time (last year Prime Minister of Belgium Guy Verhofstadt was inivited) Prof. Devos invited an important Belgian politician to talk about their vision on politics. The lesson is each time built around two main questions: 1) What is politics? 2) What are the main challenges for politicians and our society in the upcoming years/decades?
Both are really difficult to answer but Herman Van Rompuy certainly succeeded this year. Because of the limited time he didn’t really got into the second question but most of the answers were already included in his one hour speech.
Before his talk there was some protest by NSV students (nationalist student association) against unitarist Belgium. The protest was welcomed by a lot of booing by the Pol & Soc Bachelors.
