http://www.slate.com/id/2289797/
Pretty interesting stuff.
"In the event that the elections are inconclusive, the ministers continue to perform their functions. They can't undertake controversial new initiatives, because they don't have a parliamentary majority to approve it, but they can accomplish administrative tasks."
"No government" eh?
Belgium is world record holder. Iraq went over 240 days without a government in 2010. (March - November) EDIT: Actually I was wrong in November the two coalitions reached a formal deal to form a government, but it still took two more months to finalize the deal. As of now Bosnia and Herzegovina is 179 days without a government. (Held election in early October 2010.)
They still have the state bureaucracy, but not a functional goverment to come up with new bad ideas.
It's nothing to write home about.
As you rightly remarked the large and hungry bureaucracy is still in place. Local governments are still in place. I bet if the EU asked the parliament to ratify one of their masterpieces it would find a majority without problems. The only consolation for the good people of Flanders and Wallonie is the government in Brussels cannot pile up something else in top of all.
Belgium is a huge problem for the EU. It's obvious the two halves of the country would be happy to go each their merry way. But the EU simply cannot allow that. It's not that Flanders or Wallonie would secede out of the EU. It's the EU is an extremely centralized apparatus of clear Soviet origins: can you envision Stalin or Brezhnev telling, say, Kyrgyztan "You can secede, we'll still be friends". Also there are some national States inside the EU that, while supporting secession in the Balkans or the Sudan and having ratified the Helsinki Treaty, cannot stand to see it near their home.
Belgium isn't without government. It just doesn't have a functioning legislature at the moment. People confuse 'government' referring to the political party in power with 'government' referring to state functions as a whole. Even without a functioning legislative process, Belgium still has police and taxes.
I bet the Belgian equivalent of the ABCs are still pumping out a lot of regulations and rules as well.
Belgium is a huge problem for the EU. It's obvious the two halves of the country would be happy to go each their merry way. But the EU simply cannot allow that. It's not that Flanders or Wallonie would secede out of the EU.
I can believe this. (It is certainly what the EU is doing in Bosnia and Herzegovina. More than that it is pushing for maximum centralisation.) Does there exist maybe on the internet something that talks about this, or is it something that you have pieced together from many different pieces?
Apparently Belgium has been pretty much a non-country for quite some time. My man Nigel Farage:
Marko: Belgium is a huge problem for the EU. It's obvious the two halves of the country would be happy to go each their merry way. But the EU simply cannot allow that. It's not that Flanders or Wallonie would secede out of the EU. I can believe this. (It is certainly what the EU is doing in Bosnia and Herzegovina. More than that it is pushing for maximum centralisation.) Does there exist maybe on the internet something that talks about this, or is it something that you have pieced together from many different pieces? No, I pieced it together from my experience in secessionist movements stretching back more than two decades. When you see the incredible lengths a government will go to discredit a peaceful secessionist movement (one example: the firebombing in Corsica initially blamed on local secessionists and later discovered to be the work of a rogue group within the French Gendarmerie elite GIGN, probably acting under orders from "above") you start to see things in a different light. Together we go unsung... together we go down with our people | Post Points: 5
I actually think that the EU should capitalize on such secessionist movements within for its own good. A divided Belgium, an independent Scotland or Catalonia would only mean more power for he EU. There is a parallel with Hoppe’s theory of the dissolution of the feudal order, with the King joining forces with the people to eliminate the middle government of the landlords, thus gaining power for himself.
By the same token, the EU could ‘team up’ with the regions to wrestle power from the national governments. Italy and Spain would be at the mercy of the Council, or more specifically of the countries that have destroyed by means of genocide their regional divisions, such as France and England.