Nova Civitas was a Flemish think tank based on the principles of classic liberalism in combination with Anglo-Saxon conservatism. Nova Civitas claimed at its founding to be completely independent, although it was recognized and supported by the Flemish Liberal Party (VLD). The Founding Chairman of Nova Civitas, Boudewijn Bouckaert, was a long-time board member of the VLD.
According to their website, the basic principles of Nova Civitas were:
- that freedom is linked to responsibility;
- that the family must be revalorized as a cornerstone of a free society;
- that the economy should be de-feodalized, and the free entrepreneurship should be protected;
- that the rule of law must be upheld.
— Nova Civitas website
Nova Civitas was founded in 1992, in the tradition of the Belgian 1980s, Ludwig Von Mises Institute as a new political club to support the rebirth of a strong liberal movement in Belgium dominated by the VLD in Flanders and the Liberal Reformist Party in Wallonia. Nova Civitas was headquartered in Ghent. In 2004, a new regional committee was created in Antwerp, followed in 2006 by one in Brussels.
Nova Civitas opposed the "socialist welfare state" and advocated further transfers of competences from the federal to the regional levels. Nova Civitas also proposed a regrouping of political forces into what would have become a de facto two-party system, with a big centre-right/right-wing political party alliance in Flanders, [1] including VLD, Christen-Democratisch en Vlaams, New Flemish Alliance and Vlaams Belang. At the time, this stirred controversy and several Nova Civitas members were rebuked by the VLD. Senators Hugo Coveliers and Jean-Marie Dedecker were even forced to leave the party in the ensuing turmoil. [2]
In 2007, Nova Civitas member Jean-Marie Dedecker started his own political party, the eponymous List Dedecker (now: Libertarian, Direct, Democratic) and established a new think tank, Cassandra, to serve as the ideological laboratory for his party.
From 2003 to 2009, Nova Civitas granted an annual award: Liberty Prize. [3]
In 2009, both Cassandra and Nova Civitas fell victim of internal disputes, and decided to disband themselves. A new classical liberal think tank, Libera!, replaced Nova Civitas. [4] Libera! grants the annual Prize for Liberty. [5] [3]
From 2003 to 2009, Nova Civitas granted the annual Prize for Liberty. [6] Each laureate was expected to provide a Gustave de Molinari-lecture. Since the 2009, the Liberty Prize was continued by Libera!. [6]
Awards by Libera!:
The Open Flemish Liberals and Democrats is a Flemish liberal political party in Belgium. The party has been described as centre-right and has smaller factions within the party that have conservative liberal and social liberal views. The party is a member of the Liberal Group, Renew Europe, and Liberal International.
Flanders is both a cultural community and an economic region within the Belgian state, and has significant autonomy.
This article gives an overview of liberalism in Belgium. Liberalism was a dominant force since the Belgian independence from the Netherlands. It is limited to liberal parties with substantial support, mainly proved by having had a representation in parliament. The sign ⇒ denotes another party in that scheme. For inclusion in this scheme it is not necessary that parties labeled themselves as a liberal party.
Hugo F.V. Coveliers is a retired Belgian politician and lawyer. He was a member of the Belgian Chamber of People's Representatives between 1985 and 1995, and from 1993 to 2003. Since 2003, he has been a member of the Belgian Senate. He was a parliamentary chairman for the VLD in both chambers, from 1999 to 2003.
Jean-Marie Louis Dedecker is a Belgian politician.
Flemish political parties operate in the whole Flemish Community, which covers the unilingual Flemish Region and the bilingual Brussels-Capital Region. In the latter, they compete with French-speaking parties that all also operate in Wallonia. There are very few parties that operate on a national level in Belgium. Flanders generally tends to vote for right-wing, conservative parties, whereas in French-speaking Belgium the socialist party is usually the most successful one.
Eduard Marie August "Ward" Beysen was a Belgian politician and well-known freemason. He held a degree in Dutch and history teaching, obtained in 1963, in Lier and started his political career in the seventies in the Flemish liberal party, the Party for Freedom and Progress (PVV), which was renamed Flemish Liberals and Democrats (VLD) in 1992. Ward Beysen – suffering a depression – died by drowning himself in the lake of Fort 6 in the south of Antwerp.
Gerolf Emma Jozef Annemans is a Belgian lawyer, journalist and politician of the Flemish nationalist party Vlaams Belang (VB) and formerly of its predecessor, the Vlaams Blok. He has been a member of the European Parliament since 2014, and a city councilor in Antwerp since 2000. He served as a member of the Chamber of Representatives from 1987 to 2014, and as a city councilor in Brasschaat from 1994 to 2000. He was the former leader of the VB from 2012 to 2014, and led the Vlaams Blok and VB parliamentary groups from 1991 to 2013.
Boudewijn Bouckaert is a Belgian law professor, a member of the Flemish Movement, and a libertarian conservative thinker and politician. He was a Member of the Flemish Parliament for the liberal party List Dedecker. He is also a former president of the Belgian classical liberal think tanks Nova Civitas, Cassandra and Libera!.
Matthias Edward Storme is a Belgian lawyer, academic and conservative philosopher.
VLOTT is a minor Belgian right-wing liberal or fortuynist political party. Its title, VLOTT, is an acronym for "Flemish, Liberal, Independent, Tolerant, Transparent". It was founded on 23 November 2005 by ex-Open VLD member Hugo Coveliers. It participated in a list-cartel with the Vlaams Belang in the October 2006 Antwerp municipal elections and in selected provincial, municipal and district elections elsewhere in Flanders. Despite the popularity of their founder in Antwerp the shared effort of the cartel-partners did only result in a small 0.5 percent win, with no extra seat in the city-council. In 2007, VLOTT did not participate in the general elections, but their candidates appeared as independents on the Vlaams Belang ballots. Only founder Hugo Coveliers was elected to the Belgian Senate. After Coveliers withdrawal from active politics early 2012 Vlaams Belang stopped its cooperation with the party.
Karim Van Overmeire is a Flemish politician, author, city planner and member of the New Flemish Alliance party.
Federal elections were held in Belgium on 10 June 2007. Voters went to the polls in order to elect new members for the Chamber of Representatives and Senate.
Libertarian, Direct, Democratic is a conservative-liberal, libertarian, right-wing populist Flemish political party in Belgium.
The Belgian provincial, municipal and district elections of 2018 took place on Sunday 14 October 2018. They are organised by the respective regions:
In the run up to the 2024 Belgian federal election, various organisations carried out opinion polling to gauge voting intention in Belgium. The results of nationwide polls are usually numerically split into the three Belgian regions: Flanders, Brussels and Wallonia. Federal seat projections for the Chamber of Representatives are presented together under these regional polls. The federal election was part of a group of elections which also include the regional elections and the European elections held on the same day. Some polls might be undefined voting intentions without differentiating between the elections.
Lode Claes was a Belgian economist author, journalist and politician who was active within the Flemish nationalist movement.
Bert August Flor Herman Schoofs is a Belgian lawyer and former politician of the Vlaams Blok and its successor Vlaams Belang party.
Dirk Nuyts was a Belgian politician who was a member of the Christian Social Party / Christen-Democratisch en Vlaams. He served as the mayor of Schilde between 1995 and 2000.