Archive | 2019
The Flemish Linguistic Dispute
Abstract
This chapter shows how Flemish and French-speaking political actors articulate the dispute about the Flemish Periphery, with a focus on the six communes with linguistic facilities for French speakers. Minority protection in these municipalities has been the central issue of the Belgian linguistic dispute over the last fifty years. The chapter follows a similar structure and purpose to the previous chapter, with which it draws parallels and differences. The findings draw attention to the tension between the willingness of Flemish authorities to integrate newcomers, on the one hand, and the negative or discriminatory consequences of integrationist policies for the rights of French-speakers living in Flanders, on the other. As in Catalonia, the political debate is about whether the minority nation’s integrationist policies infringe rights, but there are key differences. French speakers do not make their case in individualist terms but as a minority group within Flanders. In addition, the Flemish linguistic dispute is also about territory: there are competing territorial aspirations between the integrity of officially monolingual Flanders and the expansion of the bilingual Brussels Capital Region. The author therefor suggests that the political debate is not between the territoriality and the personality principles, as it is sometimes framed, but between competing territorial aspirations.