All hail the Pax Belgica generation

A new wave of young politicians has revived hopes for a more stable political future in Belgium. Writing in La Libre Belgique, Gilles Vanden Burre of the anti-separatist BPlus movement takes the view that Sarah Turine (age 36, Ecolo), Benoît Lutgen (age 39, CDH – Humanist Democratic Centre) and Alexander De Croo (age 33, Open VLD – Flemish Liberal Democrats), who have all been recently appointed to lead their respective parties, represent a "new generation," which is more sympathetic to the cause of "cross-community bridge building." Born in the 1970s, they were among the first "children of the federalist state" to grow up without direct experience of life in a unified Belgium. "The Flemish in this new generation are less likely to feel threatened by the age-old threat of the omnipresence of the French bourgeoisie, (…) while the Francophones are more likely to cultivate a positive image of the North of the country, which is not solely based on clichés that view the inhabitants of the region as backwoods nationalists that are reluctant to engage with the outside world," notes Gilles Vanden Burren. It is on this basis that he recommends backing the new "Pax Belgica generation."