POLITICAL STRUCTURE
Belgium is a country of differences. In the past it was an unitarian country. Since 1993 it's a federal kingdom that exists from republics. King Albert II is the constitutional head of state. Belgium exists out of 3 regions and 3 communities, that have 10 provinces together. If you compare Belgium administratively with other federal countries, you can compare the Belgian "provinces" with e.g. the "counties" in the states of the USA, and the Belgian "regions" and "communities" with e.g. the "states" in the USA, the "Länder" in Germany and the "Kantons" in Switzerland. But the difference is that the governments of the regions are responsible for landbased matters (e.g. infrastructure, environment,...), while the governments of the communities are responsible for personbased matters (e.g. language, culture, education,...). The territoria of these states overleap each other, which gives Belgium a very complex political structure.
The federal kingdom Belgium exists of the Flemish Region, the Walloon Region, the Brussels Capital Region, the Flemish Community, the French Community and the German Community.
The
Flemish Region and the Flemish Community are fused together and have the same government. In Flanders (Vlaanderen) itself this government is responsible for landbased and personbased matters, while in Brussels she's only responsible for the personbased matters of the dutchspeaking inhabitants of Brussel. Her capital is Brussel.The
French Community is responsible for the personbased matters of the frenchspeaking inhabitants of Wallonia (Wallonie) and Bruxelles. Her capital is Bruxelles.The
German Community is responsible for the personbased matters of the germanspeaking inhabitants in the east of Wallonia. Her capital is Eupen.The
Walloon Region is responsible for the landbased matters in Wallonia (that also contains the germanspeaking part of Belgium). Her capital is Namur.The
Brussels Capital Region is responsible for the landbased matters in Brussel/Bruxelles. You can compare it to e.g. Washington DC in the USA. Brussel/Bruxelles is a capital 4 times: from The European Union, from Belgium, from Flanders and from the French Community. That way, everyone is happy.The Belgian political structure looks most like the one of the federal country Switzerland, that also has no own language. Switzerland has different kantons and 4 official languages (German, French, Italian and Reato-Roman). But there also are differences between Belgium and Switzerland. Like said before, Belgium is a very complex country. This complexity also irritates the Belgians itself who don't really need such separations and so much governments. Especially because these separations were created by political parties who want to have more power in their own part of Belgium (in 1993: the Flemish christiandemocratic party in Flanders and the Walloon socialist party in Wallonia). Big federal political parties don't exist anymore in Belgium (only some very little ones). The former unitarian political parties (before Belgium became a federal country) splitted up in regional political parties. This is why there are at least 4 political parties necessary in Belgium to form a government.
The consequence is that there are no longer political parties who defend the interests of the whole Belgian population. So, there sometimes are conflicts for the most stupid things between the political parties, while the Belgian population itself live in peace with each other. Another consequence of so much different political parties in the federal government is that it encourage a partycracy, a system where political parties devide public jobs and influence in public institutions for themselves. Which make that it aren't always the most competent people who get a public job, but sometimes incompetent people with the right connections with ruling political parties. Which encourage not only incompetence but corruption too and sometimes end up with scandals.
In 1996 a child rapist called Dutroux proved clearly the incompetence of Belgian police and justice like they've catched him too late (his victims were already death) because of this incompetence. This caused protest actions against the Belgian ruling class. In April 1998 this child rapist escaped for some hours because of that same incompetence of the policemen watching him. This was enough to nearly cause an uprise of the Belgian population. The Belgian ministers of Justice and Interior were forced to dismiss, and the Belgian federal government started a reformation of Belgian justice and police.
The differences between the regions and the communities make Belgians and their politicians always search compromises. Sometimes these compromises are really ridiculous and expensive ("You want this? I want it too!"). But it must be said that this system also prevented civil wars. Politicians in e.g. Israël/Palestina, Ulster/North Ireland, Bosnia, Libanon, etc. sometimes are jeaulouse about the peacefull way conflicts are solved in Belgium. They sometimes visit Belgium to look how it works.This complexity and its expenses are the price for peace. No people feel oppressed by other people. Individual matters (languages, culture,...) are seperated from common matters (infrastructure, environment,...).