The dust has yet to settle after the national and regional elections Belgium held in June. Though Flanders has now joined Wallonia in forming a government, for both the Brussels region and the Federal Government, things are still up in the air.
Nor will they be resolved too soon. As in a bumper year for Belgian democracy, municipal elections coincide with the casting of votes for national and regional governments. Not only has this made Belgian polling stations unusually active, it has also illuminated the interplay between different levels of governance.
Federal negotiations have been put on the back burner as parties turn their attention to winning seats in communes. As June produced some unexpected trends – the rise of the centre-right francophone MR, woeful results for the green parties, extreme right Vlaams Belang denied their projected triumph – the swift event of local elections can serve as a second referendum on pivotal political questions.
But unlike the elections in June, the municipals put issues that affect residents front and centre of the debate. Granted, it's a small country but one that packs in a huge amount of diversity. Belgium has 581 communes in total; in Brussels there are 19. Of course there are common challenges, but how they are met varies greatly.
You can take my word for it, as the Brussels Times team has pored over the manifestos of each party in each commune – in all, 124 campaign priorities that impact directly the daily affairs of people moving through this European capital. Together, this Local Elections Guide digs into the flaws of the city, its problem zones, neighbourhood nuisances, citizens' concerns and the measures that might, for better or worse, address them.
See Brussels in all its granular glory, not just a battleground where warring politicians apply opposing ideologies to issues of public transport or housing, but a public space evolving of its own accord. Or to be more precise, under the influence of the people living there rather than those making decisions from afar.
Sunday 13 October also gives non-Belgians a chance to have their say in how their commune is governed – an important swathe of the Brussels electorate, though most of the 310,000 internationals here have not signed up to vote.
So who best represents your concerns? Here's where to find out.
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