Download or read book Belgium written by Bernard A. Cook and published by Peter Lang. This book was released on 2002 with total page 228 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Although Belgium has only been an independent state since the 1830s, it has a long and complex past. This history is essential for understanding the complexities of issues that led to a devolution of the unitary Belgian state into a federation of linguistically based regions. In addition to the elements that contributed to Belgium's particular political evolution, the history which is traced in this book is a composite of many themes of broad historical interest and importance. Belgium: A History covers the gamut of Belgian history through dramas of religious and cultural conflict, intense localism, state building, uneven development, divergent class interests, war and domination, and finally, integration into a larger European community.
Download or read book Belgium written by Samuel Humes and published by Hurst & Company. This book was released on 2014 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This concise history describes the traditions and transitions that over two thousand years have developed in Belgium in a sense of shared identity, common government, and a centralized nation-state - and then over a few recent decades paved the way for Flemish-Walloon schism that now threatens to break up Belgium. It responds to the question: Why does a government, unified for more than 600 years, no longer seem capable of holding together a linguistically divided country In tracing the evolution of Belgian governance, Humes describes why and how the dominance of French-speaking propertied elite eroded after having monopolized the land's governance for centuries. The extension of suffrage, combined with the rise of literacy and schooling enabled labor and Flemish movements to gather sufficient momentum to fracture the Belgian polity, splitting its parties and frustrating its politics. The presence of the European Union (EU) and the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) has, in a tangential way, enable the Belgian separatists to discount the merit of a national government that is no longer needed to defend the country militarily and economically.
Download or read book Belgian Exceptionalism written by Didier Caluwaerts and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2021-11-24 with total page 240 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book takes stock of Belgium’s exceptional and – for some foreign observers –schizophrenic position in the political world and explains its idiosyncrasy to a non-Belgian audience. Offering a broad and comprehensive analysis of Belgian politics, the guiding questions throughout each of the chapters of this book are: Is Belgium a political enigma, and why? Along which axes is Belgium "exceptional" compared to other countries? And what insights does a comparative study of Belgian politics have to offer? The book therefore provides a critical assessment of how Belgian politics "stands out" internationally, both in good and bad ways – including consociationalism, federalism, democratic innovations, Euroscepticism, government formation, gender equality, among others – and which factors can explain Belgium’s exceptional position. Based on cutting-edge research findings, the book will be of wide interest to scholars and students of Belgian politics, European Politics and Comparative politics. The Open Access version of this book, available at www.taylorfrancis.com, has been made available under a Creative Commons Attribution-Non Commercial-No Derivatives 4.0 license.
Download or read book How Can One Not be Interested in Belgian History written by Benno Barnard and published by Academia Press. This book was released on 2005 with total page 154 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: As Belgian history addresses questions of identity and security, of a sense of cohesion and common purpose or the lack thereof, this volume tells you why Belgium does matter.
Download or read book Belgium An Introduction written by Nicky Huys and published by Nicky Huys. This book was released on 2023-10-29 with total page 109 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "Belgium: An Introduction" is your comprehensive guide to one of Europe's most captivating and diverse nations. This book takes you on a journey through the heart of Belgium, unveiling its rich tapestry of culture, history, cuisine, and natural beauty. From the medieval charm of Bruges to the bustling streets of Brussels, from the mastery of Belgian chocolate to the world-renowned beer culture, this book offers an in-depth look at all aspects of Belgium's unique identity. Discover the fascinating history of Belgium, including its role in both World Wars, and explore the artistic legacy of Flemish Primitives and Surrealism. Delve into the world of Belgian cuisine, from delectable waffles and mussels to the intricate art of chocolate making. Uncover the linguistic patchwork of Dutch, French, and German languages and gain insights into contemporary challenges and aspirations. With stunning imagery and detailed narratives, "Belgium: An Introduction" is a captivating introduction to the country's beauty and complexity. Whether you're a traveler planning your visit or an armchair explorer eager to learn, this book is your gateway to understanding and appreciating all that Belgium has to offer. Join us on a journey through the heart of Europe, where history, culture, and creativity merge to create the distinctive charm of Belgium.
Download or read book Nationalism in Belgium written by Kas Deprez and published by Springer. This book was released on 2016-07-27 with total page 291 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This is a book about shifting national identities in Belgium. It is an attempt to show how these identities emerged and evolved. It aims at explaining why the Belgian identity, which in 1830 was so strong that it could create a new nation-state, has become so weak that today it has to accept a mere overarching role above and in competition with the new national loyalties. More and more people wonder whether this country will survive.
Download or read book History of the Low Countries written by J. C. H. Blom and published by Berghahn Books. This book was released on 2006-06 with total page 531 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The history of the smaller European countries is rather neglected in the teaching of European history at university level. We are therefore pleased to announce the publication of the first comprehensive history of the Low Countries - in English - from Roman Times to the present. Remaining politically and culturally fragmented, with its inhabitants speaking Dutch, French, Frisian, and German, the Low Countries offer a fascinating picture of European history en miniature. For historical reasons, parts of northern France and western Germany also have to be included in the "Low Countries," a term that must remain both broad and fluid, a convenient label for a region which has seldom, if ever, composed a unified whole. In earlier ages it as even more difficult to the region set parameters, again reflecting Europe as a whole, when tribes and kingdoms stretched across expanses not limited to the present states of Belgium, Luxembourg, and the Netherlands. Nevertheless, its parts did demonstrate many common traits and similar developments that differentiated them from surrounding countries and lent them a distinct character. Internationally, the region often served both as a mediator for and a buffer to the surrounding great powers, France, Britain, and Germany; an important role still played today as Belgium and the Netherlands have increasingly become involved in the broader process of European integration, in which they often share the same interest and follow parallel policies. This highly illustrated volume serves as an ideal introduction to the rich history of the Low Countries for students and the generally interested reader alike.
Download or read book The Brussels Effect written by Anu Bradford and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2020-01-27 with total page 368 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: For many observers, the European Union is mired in a deep crisis. Between sluggish growth; political turmoil following a decade of austerity politics; Brexit; and the rise of Asian influence, the EU is seen as a declining power on the world stage. Columbia Law professor Anu Bradford argues the opposite in her important new book The Brussels Effect: the EU remains an influential superpower that shapes the world in its image. By promulgating regulations that shape the international business environment, elevating standards worldwide, and leading to a notable Europeanization of many important aspects of global commerce, the EU has managed to shape policy in areas such as data privacy, consumer health and safety, environmental protection, antitrust, and online hate speech. And in contrast to how superpowers wield their global influence, the Brussels Effect - a phrase first coined by Bradford in 2012- absolves the EU from playing a direct role in imposing standards, as market forces alone are often sufficient as multinational companies voluntarily extend the EU rule to govern their global operations. The Brussels Effect shows how the EU has acquired such power, why multinational companies use EU standards as global standards, and why the EU's role as the world's regulator is likely to outlive its gradual economic decline, extending the EU's influence long into the future.
Download or read book Medical Histories of Belgium written by David Cantor and published by Social Histories of Medicine. This book was released on 2021-10 with total page 392 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Medical histories of Belgium reshapes Belgian history of medicine by bringing together a new generation of scholars and engage with broader European developments in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.
Download or read book Belgium and the Congo 1885 1980 written by Guy Vanthemsche and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2012-04-30 with total page 301 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book explains how and why Belgium, a small but influential European country, was changed through its colonial activities in the Congo, from the first expeditions in 1880 to the Mobutu regime in the 1980s. Belgian politics, diplomacy, economic activity and culture were influenced by the imperial experience. Belgium and the Congo, 1885-1980 yields a better understanding of the Congo's past and present.
Download or read book Landscapes and Landforms of Belgium and Luxembourg written by Alain Demoulin and published by Springer. This book was released on 2017-08-25 with total page 426 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book provides an informative and intriguing overview of the most scenic landscapes of Belgium and Luxembourg. Geodiversity is emphasized, for example the periglacial features in the Hautes Fagnes area, the planation surfaces in the Ardennes and Oesling, and the famous caves of Han/Lesse and Remouchamps. The book’s chief goals are to provide the reader with enjoyable and informative descriptions of the selected sites within their regional geographical and geological settings; to offer an up-to-date survey of the evolution of Belgium’s and Luxembourg’s landscape; and to share additional information on the cultural value of the respective sites wherever appropriate. The book is a richly illustrated reference work that makes accessible for the first time a wealth of information currently scattered among many national and regional journals. It will benefit earth scientists, environmental scientists, tourism geographers and conservationists alike.
Download or read book Tort Law in Belgium written by Marc Kruithof and published by Kluwer Law International B.V.. This book was released on 2018-05-09 with total page 151 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Derived from the renowned multi-volume International Encyclopaedia of Laws, this book provides ready access to how the legal dimension of prevention against harm and loss allocation is treated in Belgium. This traditional branch of law not only tackles questions which concern every lawyer, whatever his legal expertise, but also concerns each person’s most fundamental rights on a worldwide scale. Following a general introduction that probes the distinction between tort and crime and the relationship between tort and contract, the monograph describes how the concepts of fault and unlawfulness, and of duty of care and negligence, are dealt with in both the legislature and the courts. The book then proceeds to cover specific cases of liability, such as professional liability, liability of public bodies, abuse of rights, injury to reputation and privacy, vicarious liability, liability of parents and teachers, liability for handicapped persons, product liability, environmental liability, and liability connected with road and traffic accidents. Principles of causation, grounds of justification, limitations on recovery, assessment of damages and compensation, and the role of private insurance and social security are all closely considered. Its succinct yet scholarly nature, as well as the practical quality of the information it provides, make this book a valuable resource for lawyers Belgium. Academics and researchers will also welcome this very useful guide, and will appreciate its value not only as a contribution to comparative law but also as a stimulus to harmonization of the rules on tort.
Download or read book The Sorrows of Belgium written by Martin Conway and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2012-01-12 with total page 427 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The liberation of Belgium by Allied troops in September 1944 marked the end of a harsh German Occupation, but also the beginning of a turbulent and decisive period in the history of the country. There would be no easy transition to peace. Instead, the rival political forces of King Leopold III and his supporters, the former government in exile in London, and the Resistance movements which had emerged during the Occupation confronted each other in a bitter struggle for political ascendancy. The subsequent few years were dominated by an almost continual air of political and social crisis as Resistance demonstrations, strikes, and protests for and against the King appeared to threaten civil war and the institutional dissolution of the country. And yet by 1947 a certain stability had been achieved: the Resistance groups had been marginalised, the Communist Party was excluded from government, the King languished in unwilling exile in Switzerland, and, most tangibly, the pre-war political parties and the parliamentary political regime had been restored. In this substantial contribution to the history of the liberation era in Europe, Martin Conway provides the first account, based on substantial new archival material, of this process of political normalisation, which provided the basis for the integration of Belgium into the post-war West European political order. That success, however, came at a cost: the absence of any substantial political reform after the Second World War exacerbated the tensions between the different social classes, linguistic communities, and regions within Belgium, providing the basis for the gradual unravelling of the Belgian nation-state which occurred over the second half of the twentieth century.
Download or read book King Leopold s Ghost written by Adam Hochschild and published by Picador. This book was released on 2019-05-14 with total page 474 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: With an introduction by award-winning novelist Barbara Kingsolver In the late nineteenth century, when the great powers in Europe were tearing Africa apart and seizing ownership of land for themselves, King Leopold of Belgium took hold of the vast and mostly unexplored territory surrounding the Congo River. In his devastatingly barbarous colonization of this area, Leopold stole its rubber and ivory, pummelled its people and set up a ruthless regime that would reduce the population by half. . While he did all this, he carefully constructed an image of himself as a deeply feeling humanitarian. Winner of the Duff Cooper Prize in 1999, King Leopold’s Ghost is the true and haunting account of this man’s brutal regime and its lasting effect on a ruined nation. It is also the inspiring and deeply moving account of a handful of missionaries and other idealists who travelled to Africa and unwittingly found themselves in the middle of a gruesome holocaust. Instead of turning away, these brave few chose to stand up against Leopold. Adam Hochschild brings life to this largely untold story and, crucially, casts blame on those responsible for this atrocity.
Download or read book A History of World Egyptology written by Andrew Bednarski and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2021-05-27 with total page 1135 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A History of World Egyptology is a ground-breaking reference work that traces the study of ancient Egypt over the past 150 years. Global in purview, it enlarges our understanding of how and why people have looked, and continue to look, into humankind's distant past through the lens of the enduring allure of ancient Egypt. Written by an international team of scholars, the volume investigates how territories around the world have engaged with, and have been inspired by, ancient Egypt and its study, and how that engagement has evolved over time. Chapters present a specific territory from different perspectives, including institutional and national, while examining a range of transnational links as well. The volume thus touches on multiple strands of scholarship, embracing not only Egyptology, but also social history, the history of science and reception studies. It will appeal to amateurs and professionals with an interest in the histories of Egypt, archaeology and science.
Download or read book Selling the Congo written by Matthew G. Stanard and published by U of Nebraska Press. This book was released on 2012-01-01 with total page 404 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Belgium was a small, neutral country without a colonial tradition when King Leopold II ceded the Congo, his personal property, to the state in 1908. For the next half century Belgium not only ruled an African empire but also, through widespread, enduring, and eagerly embraced propaganda, produced an imperialist-minded citizenry. Selling the Congo is a study of European pro-empire propaganda in Belgium, with particular emphasis on the period 1908–60. Matthew G. Stanard questions the nature of Belgian imperialism in the Congo and considers the Belgian case in light of literature on the French, British, and other European overseas empires. Comparing Belgium to other imperial powers, the book finds that pro-empire propaganda was a basic part of European overseas expansion and administration during the modern period. Arguing against the long-held belief that Belgians were merely “reluctant imperialists,” Stanard demonstrates that in fact many Belgians readily embraced imperialistic propaganda. Selling the Congo contributes to our understanding of the effectiveness of twentieth-century propaganda by revealing its successes and failures in the Belgian case. Many readers familiar with more-popular histories of Belgian imperialism will find in this book a deeper examination of European involvement in central Africa during the colonial era.
Download or read book The Politics of Belgium written by Marleen Brans and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2013-09-13 with total page 250 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: For too long Belgium remained an unexplored terrain by comparative political scientists. Belgium's politics were best known through the writings of Arend Lijphart, who considered it a model case of consociationalism. Over the past ten to fifteen years, the analysis of consociationalism has been complemented by a more detailed coverage of Belgium's spectacular transformation process from a unitary into a federal state, moving rapidly now to disintegration. Likewise, several peculiar aspects of Belgian politics, such as the record fragmentation of its party system, have been covered in edited volumes or international journals. However, given the complexity of the Belgian configuration of political institutions and actors, any inclusion of particular aspects of the Belgian case in comparative work calls for an in depth and integrated understanding of the broader political system. This is the first book which provides such an analysis. It brings together a team of 19 political scientists and sociologists who aim to explain the dynamics and incentives of institutional change and seek to analyze the intricate interplay between the main institutional components of the Belgian body politic. The sociological, political and institutional determinants and the consequences of the "federalisation" process of Belgium is the central theme that links each of the individual chapters. This book will be essential reading for students who want to understand the politics of Belgium and for anyone with a strong interest in West European Politics, comparative politics and comparative federalism. This book was published as a special issue of West European Politics.
