Voters in the predominantly Dutch-speaking Flanders region of Belgium are considered more conservative than voters in the predominantly French-speaking Wallonia region. Not yet Dan Delespol It shows that there is reason to question whether the two regions constitute different political worlds.
The structure of Western European party systems has long been shaped by persistent political divisions (called cleavages) resulting from long-standing group conflicts. Historically, these divisions have been based on a few social divisions (mainly class and religion) that have resulted in stable and lasting bonds between political parties and voters.
Belgium has always been characterized as a classic example of such structures accompanied by social structural conflicts. In this context, three popular parties – the Christian Democrats, the Social Democrats, and the Liberals – were able to dominate political life by integrating their members into a number of “pillar” organizations.
However, since the 1970s, Western European party systems have entered a state of flux. Rising prosperity, rising levels of education, secularization and the erosion of old class structures have weakened the political bonds forged through powerful modern collective identities.
At the same time, cultural and economic globalization has resulted in a growing sense of threat among low-skilled workers with fewer opportunities for social mobility. The result of these developments is the emergence of a new cultural divide centered on the ideological differences between “universalism” and “particularism.”
The formation of these new divisions is linked to the recent success of the Greens and far-right parties. Belgium has been a leader in these developments. In Flanders, a Dutch-speaking region of Belgium, the green party Agalev and the far-right Vlaams Blok enjoyed success in the early 1980s.
Green parties also emerged in French-speaking Belgium, but the success of far-right parties was much more limited. The far-right National Front (FN) and the right-wing populist People’s Party (PP) both fell below the electoral threshold after the election. Early breakthrough. Following this pattern, the Walloon far-right party Chez Nous won a disappointing 2.83% of the vote in the most recent local elections in June 2024. As a result, the Francophone cultural divide was only half mobilized.
The absence of a far right in French-speaking Belgium means that the country is now an exception to the ubiquitous process of political change observed elsewhere. At the same time, questions arise whether new cultural divisions have materialized in both countries. Indeed, previous research suggests that cultural conflict in French-speaking Belgium is masked by stronger class divisions. Since French-speaking Belgium is relatively less wealthy than Flanders, is more class conscious, and has historically tended to vote for left-wing parties, there is much room to suggest that this hypothesis is plausible.
Belgium, an asymmetric political space?
In a recent co-authored study, I investigated potential asymmetries in the structure of the Belgian cleavage by comparing the ideological structures of Flemish and French-speaking voters. Our starting point is the relational method of multiple correspondence analysis (CSA/MCA) (by class), which was used to extract consistent ideological dimensions across 17 key political issues among voters (based on 2020 post-election surveys). . This analysis is based on the demand side of politics and therefore informs us of the ideological conflicts of the two language groups.
Figure 1: Political space in Flanders
Note: The chart shows clouds in the active category with above-average contribution to the Flemish subspace. For more details, please refer to the author’s attached paper. European Political Science Review.
Figure 2: Political space in French-speaking Belgium.
Note: The chart shows active category clouds with above-average contributions to the French-speaking subspace. For more details, please refer to the author’s attached paper. European Political Science Review.
The results of this analysis are projected in Figures 1 and 2, which visualize the political space of Flanders and French-speaking Belgium. Categories chosen by the same respondent are close to each other. Two main ideological aspects are present in both regions of the country: the cultural aspect and the economic aspect. The cultural dimension combines anti-immigration, Euroscepticism, welfare chauvinism, and morality issues. On the economic side, there are issues related to social benefits, fiscal policy, international trade and the organization of welfare states.
In broad terms, this analysis tells us two things. First, the correlation between the dimensions of the two figures is high. This means that the disruption in both language groups is likely to consist of similar issues. Nonetheless, analyzing the relative contributions of categories reveals some differences.
The Flemish economic dimension focuses more on the question of “who” is entitled to access the welfare state (e.g. “owners” or “hard workers” of the state), while the French-speaking one focuses on “what” and “how” it distributes. There is more polarization about whether to do it or not. It is also noteworthy that the issue of national reform (“communalism”) is of great importance to the Flemish cultural dimension, but not at all to the two dimensions in French-speaking Belgium.
Next, we see that the polarization encapsulated by these dimensions differs slightly between the two voters. Flemish voters are more polarized around cultural attitudes, while French-speaking voters are less divided over economic issues. Because French-speaking people have a strong left-wing tendency economically, there appears to be a welfare agreement that blocks the breakthrough of the extreme right.
Political party institutions and social structure
From these observations, we can learn that the differences between Flanders and French-speaking Belgium are influenced not only by situational factors but also by public opinion. In the second step of the analysis, we examined two additional factors of potential asymmetry: social structure and voting behavior.
Figure 3: Regional divisions and voters in Flanders
Note: Please refer to the author’s accompanying paper for further details. European Political Science Review.
Figure 4: Regional divisions and voters in French-speaking Belgium
Note: Please refer to the author’s accompanying paper for further details. European Political Science Review.
Again, two conclusions can be drawn by predicting these factors. First, statistical tests show that only three structural characteristics are significant in political space. These are education, income and subnational identity (feeling closer to Flemish or Francophone than Belgian). The impact of these social divisions is roughly the same in both regions of the country, although linguistic divisions carry a much greater weight in Flanders.
Second, we find that working-class voters are noticeably closer to social democratic voters in French-speaking Belgium (PS) than in Flanders (sp.a). This difference in structural alignment is significant, but not surprising given the historically different electoral strategies pursued by the two parties. While sp.a promoted a ‘third way’ agenda aimed at middle-class socio-cultural professionals, PS remained closer to the core principles of social insurance favored by the working class. The PS appears to have been able to create an effective buffer against the far right by consolidating the working class vote.
French-speaking cultural divide
All this suggests that cultural divisions have taken shape in French-speaking Belgium, albeit in a different form than in Flanders. However, this new politicization of divisions seems to have been overshadowed by the more salient class issues triggered by the social-democratic PS’s social insurance agenda.
The Belgian case thus indicates that differences in national divisions arise through the combined influence of ideology and party institutions. This iterative model of division formation ensures that political realignments occur only when new issues and conflicts are expressed by political parties or politicians.
In conclusion, the main implication of this analysis is that Flemish voters and French-speaking voters do not necessarily form separate political worlds. Instead, the asymmetry of Belgian political space is a product of different party strategies and welfare agreements supported by French-speaking voters.
For more information, see the author’s accompanying paper (co-authored with Cecil Meeusen, Koen Abts and Marc Swyngedouw). European Political Science Review.
Note: This article gives the views of the author and not the position of EUROPP (European Politics and Policy) or the London School of Economics. Featured image credit: European Union
