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SOCIOLOGY TRANSFORMED
Series Editors: John Holmwood and
Stephen Turner
SOCIOLOGY
IN BELGIUM
A Sociological History
Raf Vanderstraeten
Kaat Louckx
Sociology Transformed
Series Editors
John Holmwood
School of Sociology and Social Policy
University of Nottingham
Nottingham, UK
Stephen Turner
Department of Philosophy
University of South Florida
Tampa, FL, USA
“What has sociology been like in a small but profoundly divided nation? In
their concise analysis of the Belgian case Raf Vanderstraeten and Kaat Louckx
depict how this particular national tradition has been entangled in a changing
international environment. From its privileged relationship to France and the
Netherlands, it developed a more Anglo-American orientation, while retaining
some of its most salient ties to national institutions. This is a vivid, sociological
portrayal of its entire history, from Quetelet to the present.”
—Johan Heilbron, author of The Rise of Social Theory and French Sociology
The field of sociology has changed rapidly over the last few decades.
Sociology Transformed seeks to map these changes on a country by
country basis and to contribute to the discussion of the future of the
subject. The series is concerned not only with the traditional centres of
the discipline, but with its many variant forms across the globe.
More information about this series at

http://www.springer.com/series/14477
Raf Vanderstraeten · Kaat Louckx
Sociology in Belgium
A Sociological History
Raf Vanderstraeten Kaat Louckx
Department of Sociology Department of Sociology
Ghent University University of Chicago
Ghent, Belgium Chicago, IL, USA
Sociology Transformed
ISBN 978-1-137-55662-2 ISBN 978-1-137-55663-9 (eBook)
https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-55663-9
Library of Congress Control Number: 2017947735
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United Kingdom
Contents
1 Sociology in Belgium 1
2 Religion 23
3 Language 59
4 Publications 93
5 Epilogue 125
Index 131
v
List of Figures
Fig. 3.1 Number of French- and Dutch-speaking sociology

graduatesin Belgium, 1967–1990
(three yearly moving numbers) 82
Fig. 4.1 Growth of the number of researchers in
Flanders, 1982–2016 (1982 = 100) 101
Fig. 4.2 Average number of authors per article
(three yearly moving averages) 106
Fig. 4.3 Proportion of male authors
(three yearly moving averages) 108
Fig. 4.4 Proportion of authors from Belgium or the Netherlands 110
Fig. 4.5 Publications in SSCI-journals (absolute numbers) 113
Fig. 4.6 Barycentres for the places of publication of
books in the social sciences and humanities and
of the Flemish universities 117
vii
Prologue
Although the rise and the institutionalization of the social sciences are
closely entangled with long-term processes of nation-building and state-
formation, specific national traditions within the social sciences cannot
be understood within their specific national context only. These national
traditions are embedded within more encompassing settings; they are
challenged and made possible by cross-national transfers and the transna-
tional circulation of scholars and ideas.
This book is an attempt to internationalize a national history of soci-
ology. It aims to internationalize the history of sociology in Belgium in
two different, but interrelated ways: by considering the factors that dif-
ferentiate the history of sociology in Belgium from other national his-
tories, and by tracing more general patterns which this history owes to
transnational exchanges and developments. By exploring this complex
transnational setting, we believe that sociologists will gradually become
able to properly analyse the social structures that shape their own orien-
tations and their own work.
In order to understand the long-term trajectory of sociology in
Belgium, this book will focus on the structural conditions and their his-
torical transformation from the nineteenth until the twenty-first century.
It will make use of historical-sociological analyses to shed light on the
various ways in which complex social structures define the kinds of socio-
logical knowledge that are or are not valued in Belgium. In this sense,
this book is intended to constitute a contribution to the sociology of
ix
x Prologue
sociology. It aims to come to a better self-understanding of sociology in

Belgium and elsewhere.
This book builds upon work that has for the main part been con-
ducted during the last decade. In this period of time, we had occasion to
present our analyses in a substantial number of seminars, workshops and
conferences. We would like to thank the many friends, family and col-
leagues who made themselves available for the discussion of various top-
ics presented in the following text. Without their supportive feedback,
this book would not have been what it now is.
CHAPTER 1
Sociology in Belgium
Abstract This chapter starts with a sketch of the sociopolitical context

within which sociology developed in Belgium. Afterwards three core
aspects of the history of sociology are discussed: the rise of social sci-
ence and the social statistics of Adolphe Quetelet in the mid-nineteenth
century, the different ideological settings or pillars within which the
first sociological institutes emerged in the period around 1900, and the
expansion of the Dutch- and French-speaking scientific communities in
the period after the Second World War. The final section presents a short
discussion of the merits and the characteristics of a reflective sociological
approach, of a sociological history of sociology.
Keywords Social statistics · Adolphe Quetelet · Institut de Sociologie

Solvay · Société Belge de Sociologie
We can only acquire an understanding of sociology as it developed

in Belgium by bringing together various lines of thought. To intro-
duce the approach taken in this book, this chapter first provides a brief
sketch of the sociopolitical context within which sociology developed in
Belgium. Afterwards, we discuss three core aspects of the development
of sociology in Belgium: the rise of social science and the social statis-
tics of Adolphe Quetelet in the mid-nineteenth century, the different
ideological contexts within which the first sociological institutes emerged
in the period around 1900, and the expansion of the Dutch- and
© The Author(s) 2018 1

R. Vanderstraeten and K. Louckx, Sociology in Belgium, Sociology
Transformed, https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-55663-9_1
2 R. Vanderstraeten and K. Louckx
French-speaking scientific communities in the period after the Second

World War. The final section of this chapter presents a short discussion
of the main characteristics of the reflective sociological approach upon
which this book is based.
L’Union Fait La Force?

After a turbulent era, characterized by much political unrest within large
parts of Europe, the Kingdom of Belgium gained political independence
in 1830. Its rather complex political and legislative structure, which took
shape in recent decades, is the result of a series of tensions and conflicts,
some of which antedated the foundation of the Belgian state. Language
and religion have played a key role in Belgium’s history, in the ways in
which the new Kingdom has tried to establish itself as a ‘modern’ nation-
state and distinguish itself from its neighbours. Perhaps Rogers Brubaker
had Belgium in mind when he argued that ‘language and religion are
arguably the two most socially and politically consequential domains of
cultural difference in the modern world’ (2013, p. 2).
After the Belgian Revolution, the new Kingdom adopted the motto
L’union fait la force (unity makes strength). As historians argue, the
motto first of all referred to the unification of progressive Liberals
and conservative Catholics in opposition to the Netherlands and its
Protestant King. But different interpretations were later added: it is
now mostly said to refer to the unity of the different language com-
munities on the territory of the Belgian state, especially of the Dutch-
speaking part (called Flanders) and the French-speaking part (Wallonia).
However, the deliberate use of this motto cannot conceal the fact that
both politico-religious and linguistic differences have led to divisive
forms of conflict and diversity on Belgian territory during a period of
about two centuries.
In Europe, the collapse of Napoleonic France in 1815 brought an
end to about 25 years of nearly continuous war. The Congress of Vienna
aimed to provide long-term peace by settling critical issues arising from
the French Revolutionary Wars and the Napoleonic Wars. Its objective
was not simply to restore old boundaries and hence to confirm France’s
loss of the territories it had recently annexed; it also was to resize the
main powers so they could balance each other off and remain at peace.
In 1815, a United Kingdom of the Netherlands was formed, which
included the former Dutch Republic in the north as well as the so-called
1 SOCIOLOGY IN BELGIUM 3
Southern or Catholic Netherlands, which comprised most of present-

day Belgium and Luxembourg, but which had been annexed by France
in 1794.
Despite the objectives of the Congress of Vienna, the United
Kingdom of the Netherlands was but a short-lived kingdom. It col-
lapsed after the 1830 Belgian Revolution and secession. Various
social differences had created obstacles for the unification policies of
King William I of the Netherlands. Especially religious matters (the
Protestant North versus the Catholic South) were important in the
conflict preceding the separation of Belgium and the Netherlands,
which explains the focus on ideological unity in Belgium in the years
after the separation. Language issues also played a role in the conflict
that led to the Belgian secession. French was spoken in Wallonia and
by a large part of the bourgeoisie in Flemish cities; ‘Frenchification’
had also been intensive in the years after the annexation by France.
But Flanders was part of the Dutch-language territory in Europe
and the language policy of the Dutch King in the years after 1815
had aimed at (re-)uniting the two regions (North and South) under
a common Dutch language. After the Revolution, Belgium’s ‘found-
ing fathers’ meant to appease linguistic unrest by constitutionally
declaring ‘the use of the languages optional’.
In practice, however, French was clearly perceived as the more
prestigious language. Although the majority of the Belgian popula-
tion was Flemish-speaking, French quickly replaced Dutch in all offi-
cial domains and official functions. French was not only the language
of Enlightenment, progress and modernity; it was above all also a
symbol for the national struggle for independence from the Dutch
King. Knowledge of French subsequently also became an essential
requirement for social mobility in the new nation-state. During the
late-nineteenth and twentieth century, however, tensions between the
different linguistic communities resurfaced within Belgium. A broad
variety of administrative rearrangements gradually resulted from bitter
linguistic and socio-political conflicts. In the second half of the last
century, these conflicts gave way to the division of the Belgian state
into different political and legislative entities primarily defined on the
basis of language.
Present-day Belgium counts approximately 11 million inhabitants. It
is a federal state, consisting of four different political entities constituted
on the basis of language. In Flanders, the northern part of Belgium,
with approximately 58% of the population, the official language is Dutch,

but the variety of Dutch spoken here has also been called ‘Flemish’,
‘Flemish Dutch’, ‘Belgian Dutch’ or ‘Southern Dutch’. The French-
speaking community is located in the south and called Wallonia (with
about 32% of the population). The small German-speaking community
is situated in the east (0.6%), while the Dutch-French bilingual com-
munity of the capital of Brussels is in the centre of the country (9.5%).
The different regional governments have legislative power in present-
day Belgium; their jurisdictional frontiers, being language borders, are
defined in the Belgian Constitution. As we will see time and again, how-
ever, the creation of linguistically homogeneous administrative and polit-
ical entities also resulted in the communicative ‘isolation’ of the different
language communities.
Ideological and linguistic differences constitute important socio-
cultural cleavages within Belgium—despite its national motto. These
differences and cleavages also built and build the context within which
sociology developed and develops. As we will see in the following chap-
ters, the heterogeneous sociocultural and academic structures have
given rise to the development of different sociologies in Belgium. It is
difficult to speak of sociology in Belgium as a single unit; we will rather
analyse the ways in which sociology has been conceived and structured in
Belgium as plural. On the following pages, we will pay ample attention
to the rise of different communities of sociologists on Belgian territory.
We will analyse how the conditions within which sociological knowledge
is fabricated in Belgium influence(d) the kinds of sociological knowledge
that are or are not fabricated in Belgium.
Adolphe Quetelet
It is often said that ‘progress’ and ‘improvement’ were among the
favourite words of the modern world (e.g. Headrick 2000; Slack
2014). The eighteenth and nineteenth centuries were characterized
not only by a growing thirst for knowledge, but also by a strong faith
that more knowledge would lead to the betterment of humankind.
The scientific search for knowledge was thought to lead to controlled
progress. The very idea of a science of society (‘science sociale’) that
emerged in Europe in the late-eighteenth and early-nineteenth cen-
turies also incorporated instrumental connotations; it clearly linked
scientific ambitions with public policy. This idea of ‘social science’
carried practical and reformist connotations as a ‘rational’ guide to

public policy and social reconstruction.
Protagonists of this idea often made use of the analogy with natural
science. Many of the initiatives taken in the course of the nineteenth cen-
tury recurred to the natural sciences as a model for social analysis. In a
variety of circles, the technical and material advances that came from the
applications of the natural sciences gave rise to a corresponding expecta-
tion of the social advances that would follow the construction of a ‘posi-
tive’ science of society—expectations that were only intensified by those
natural scientists who furthered their claims to public recognition and
support by hinting at the likely benefits once the scientific method was
extended into the domain of social behaviour. Science was at the heart
of this positivist ‘ideology’ of progress (see Head 1982; Goldman 2002).
Social science, as it was first institutionalized in Belgium, embodied a
peculiar form of a science of government. It was considered legitimate
insofar as it focused on problems of government, paying particular atten-
tion to issues of social stability and moral order. The Higher Education
Act of 1835 allowed Belgian universities to organize a programme in
political and administrative sciences, but also stressed its dependence on
existing legal study programmes (Gerard 1992, pp. 1–8). A few years
later, in 1843, the Belgian Royal Academy created a class for the moral
and political sciences. As its French counterpart, the Belgian Academy
thereby built on the view that social science was a branch of an overarch-
ing ‘moral science’, which would provide indirect but useful support to
the national government and other factions of the ruling elites (Vincent
2007; Heilbron 2015, p. 211).
Outside the academic system, several ‘state servants’ also expressed
an interest in the elaboration of a science of society. Adolphe Quetelet’s
project of a ‘physique sociale’ (social physics), which was started in the
late 1830s in Belgium, offers a clear illustration of the modern belief in
the applicability of science to all fields of human endeavour. Quetelet
(1796–1874) was trained as a mathematician, but rapidly expanded
his horizon. He became a teacher of mathematics, physics and astron-
omy. He also investigated a range of demographic phenomena, such as
birth and death rates, as well as so-called ‘moral’ statistics, such as mar-
riages, suicides and crimes. His modus operandi was to assemble as many
numerical observations as he could and then look for patterns or regu-
larities and averages (‘l’homme moyen’ or the ‘average man’). With the
help of statistics, he hoped to find and understand those patterns, and
to use that understanding to predict the future and eventually control the
‘social body’ (Louckx 2014).1 He not only hoped to formulate the laws
of society comparable to the laws of physics (hence: social physics), but
also believed to be able to improve social politics on this scientific basis.
Quetelet is often identified as one of the founding fathers of empiri-
cal sociology (Headrick 2000, pp. 80–84; Donnelly 2015). However, as
important as Quetelet’s own analyses of social statistics may have been
his contributions to the establishment of a bureaucratic apparatus that
could take care of the production of these statistics. Quetelet became a
tireless promoter of data collection based on standardized methods and
definitions. He was an institution builder, who devoted much effort to
the diffusion and implementation of such standardized data collection.
Some ten years after Belgium gained independence, he organized the
Commission Centrale de Statistique, which became the central agency for
the collection and publication of administrative statistics in Belgium. In
1846, he organized the first nationwide population census, participation
in which was obligatory for all residents. After 1846, censuses followed
at regular, mostly ten-yearly intervals in Belgium; Quetelet remained
in charge of the censuses taken in 1856 and 1866. In 1853, Quetelet
also organized, hosted and presided over the first Congrès International
de Statistique, which launched the development of many methodologi-
cal standards and uniform nomenclatures. For more than two decades,
sessions of this Congress were actively attended by high-level state
servants from around the world. Indeed, ‘those who attended pushed
their governments to adopt a standard template for census making on
the Queteletian model’ (Curtis 2002, pp. 20–21). The International
Statistical Institute, which was founded in 1885, currently still presents
itself as the heir of Quetelet’s Congress.
1 In several regards, the views of Comte and Quetelet are quite similar. Remarkably, how-
ever, Comte and Quetelet, who were contemporaries, did not refer to each other’s work.
“Ils sont entièrement indépendants. Quetelet a ignoré Comte, Comte a voulu ignorer
Quetelet” (Lottin 1912, pp. 366–367). Émile Durkheim later maintained that Quetelet’s
theory felt short of explaining how “the average man” and its statistical laws could exert
any force on individuals. Quetelet’s theory rested in Durkheim’s well-known view on an
inaccurate observation, because it required social forces to act on individuals at an evenly
distributed rate. Durkheim instead recurred to collective forces to explain variations in sui-
cide rates (Durkheim 1897).
The nineteenth-century rise of administrative statistics, in Belgium

as elsewhere, underpinned a new discourse about society. This admin-
istrative statistics helped ‘imagining’ a new sort of object, which could
be both the target of scientific research and of policy interventions. It
helped identifying social problems, such as pauperism or vagrancy, and
suggesting strategies for addressing them (Louckx 2014, 2017a, b;
Louckx and Vanderstraeten 2014, 2015). Its increasing prominence also
encouraged definitions of social science in terms of its practical applica-
tions. Social physics and sociology inevitably became perceived as rem-
edy, in the medical imagery employed so often in this context, for social
pathology (see also Goldman 1987, 2002).
Quetelet’s work led to a number of other initiatives. Edouard
Ducpétiaux (1804–1868), for example, who was a member of the
Commission Centrale de Statistique, undertook family budget stud-
ies of the working class in Belgium (Ducpétiaux 1855).2 In 1862,
the Association Internationale pour le Progrès des Sciences Sociales
(International Association for the Progress of the Social Sciences) was
founded in Brussels. The Association explicitly sailed under the flag of
the social sciences; it laid claim to scientific credentials in its investiga-
tions. But it provided first and foremost a forum for liberal politicians
interested in social ‘enlightenment’ and likeminded policy-oriented rec-
ommendations. It was dissolved in 1867, but reappeared shortly in the
1890s under the name of Association Belge pour le Progrès Social (Belgian
Association for Social Progress). Even if their impact may be considered
to have been minor, the very existence of these associations provides
proof of the ‘modern’ belief in the authority of scientific knowledge
and the legitimacy of politics on the basis of facts and hard data (de
Bie 1983; Vanthemsche 1994; Goldman 2002, 2007; Van Dijck 2008,
pp. 63–65).
In the last decades of the nineteenth century, the introduction of soci-
ology in university curricula started to generate much debate in Belgium.
No doubt, this was to an important degree the result of developments
in neighbouring countries, especially France, where, building on the
positivist project of Auguste Comte, scholars as Émile Durkheim and
René Worms had been able to shift sociology to the centre of academic
2 Karl Marx used Ducpétiaux’ work as a source of information on Belgium in the 25th
chapter of the first book of Das Kapital (Marx 1867).

interest. The openness towards sociology in academic circles in Belgium

was limited, however. Often preference was here also given to the term
‘social science’, as Comte’s neologism ‘sociology’ was associated with
socialism and state interventionism. To understand the arduous intro-
duction and expansion of sociology in Belgium, some differentia specifica
of the Belgian academic and sociocultural context need to be taken into
account.
Brussels and Louvain

Opportunities for the new discipline were provided by the expanding
universities, which offered a widening range of career trajectories and a
larger degree of autonomy from governmental affairs. At the end of the
nineteenth century, however, the ‘academization’ of sociology still met
with much resistance. The rector of the University of Liège, for example,
discussed the creation of a programme in the social and political sciences
at the start of the academic year 1884/1885. However, he did not see
a place for sociology in this programme—as sociology had yet failed to
fulfil any of its promises: ‘Elle n’est guère jusqu’ici qu’une table des mat-
ières dont il reste à remplir les chapitres’ (Trasenster 1884, p. 9).3 His
colleagues shared his reservations. The inaugural address of the rector of
the University of Brussels, Eugène Van der Rest, presented at the start of
the academic year 1888/1889 was titled ‘La Sociologie’. Van der Rest
explicitly referred to the writings of Comte, Spencer and Durkheim, but
also questioned the usefulness of the all-encompassing aspirations of a
discipline directed at ‘la vie sociale toute entière’ (1888, p. 33; see also de
Bie 1985, pp. 22–33). At the start of the next academic year, he repeated
and specified his preference for a curriculum in which the applied, policy-
oriented social sciences rather than sociology would prevail (Van der Rest
1889; see also Giddings 1891).
With its programme in political and social sciences, set up in 1889,
the ‘free-thinking’ University of Brussels was the first in Belgium to pro-
vide for a social science curriculum (Wils 2005, pp. 276–277; Wils and
Rasmussen 2012, pp. 1277–1278). By and large, this interfaculty pro-
gramme aimed at supporting the development of ‘moderate’ solutions
3 “It [sociology] is thus far but a table of contents of which the chapters remain to be
written”.
to the sociopolitical problems of modern, industrializing states. Its

main architects, including Van der Rest, were close to the liberal tradi-
tion. Although a course on sociology was deliberately not included, the
programme provided a home to the socialist intellectuals Hector Denis
(1842–1913) and Guillaume De Greef (1842–1924). Both defended at
that time the need for a socialist and sociological approach of the socio-
economic system. De Greef, for example, wrote in his introduction to
sociology, originally published in 1886: ‘At the present time, the unity
of socialism and positive science is an established fact; what remains to
be done is to tighten and perfection this unity and to draw the legitimate
conclusions’ (1911, p. 229).4
Before this sociological project could really take off, however, the
University of Brussels itself went through a crisis. The immediate cause
was the cancellation by the Academic Board of the University of a pro-
jected lecture series by the French geographer and anarchist Elisée
Reclus, but more lasting ideological and political differences also played
a key role (Van Rooy 1976; Noël 1988). In 1894, the crisis resulted in
the foundation of a dissident Université Nouvelle (New University) that
was supported by a variety of socialists and progressive liberals. De Greef,
who had given up his position at the University of Brussels as a way to
protest against the ‘Reclus affair’, became its rector.
Although its departmental infrastructure was unstable, the Université
Nouvelle gave ample room to philosophy and the social sciences (Despy-
Meyer and Goffin 1976; Despy-Meyer 1994). Many foreign schol-
ars were invited to teach: apart from the brothers Élie, Élisée and Paul
Reclus, scholars such as Gabriel Tarde, René Worms, Marcel Mauss and
Maurice Halbwachs gave lectures in Brussels in the era around 1900.5
The position of the Université Nouvelle remained precarious, however.
4 “A l’heure actuelle, l’union du socialisme et de la science positive est un fait accompli; il
ne s’agit plus que de la rendre de plus en plus intime et parfaite et d’en tirer les conclusions
légitimes”. De Greef’s introduction into sociology was reviewed by Durkheim (1886); his
writings were translated into several languages. For an early assessment of his whole socio-
logical oeuvre, see also Douglas (1926).
5 Tarde, for example, provided an introductory course on sociology in 1896/1897,
while Worms gave a series of lectures on the sociological thought of Auguste Comte in
1909/1910. An overview is presented in Despy-Meyer and Goffin (1976), although it
seems probable that not all of the scheduled lectures actually took place. Overall, how-
ever, the lecture programme of the Université Nouvelle was strongly inspired by Comtean
positivism.
While its degrees were not officially recognized in Belgium, only a few
Belgian students enrolled. The dissident institution counted each year
only around 100 students, about half of which were foreigners (Despy-
Meyer 1973, p. 8). Like many other experiments in internationalism
from that period, the Université Nouvelle did not outlive the First World
War (see Pyenson and Verbruggen 2009; Van Acker 2014; Verbruggen
and Carlier 2014). It neither had much lasting impact in Belgium,
although some of its parts were in 1919 re-integrated into its ‘mother
institution’, the Université Libre de Bruxelles.
At the end of the nineteenth century, the conflicts at the Brussels
University also initiated responses from the industrial chemist and pol-
itician Ernest Solvay (1838–1922). Solvay, who had witnessed the cri-
sis at the University of Brussels as a member of its Academic Board,
belonged to the progressive wing of liberalism, which kept close con-
tacts with socialist intellectuals. He shared their belief in the capacity
of science to develop blueprints for a better and fairer organization of
the ‘social fabric’, although his own vision remained definitely liberal in
outlook. Concerned about social progress and social innovation, he put
much emphasis on the maximization of people’s ‘productive capacity’.
To elaborate his ideas scientifically, he founded in 1894 the Institut des
Sciences Sociales and appointed three collaborators who had sharply pro-
tested against the decision taken by their university in the Reclus affair:
Denis and De Greef, as well as Émile Vandervelde (1866–1938). Solvay
also contributed actively to his own research institute; in the Annales de
l’Institut des Sciences Sociales, he published repeatedly on socio-economic
and monetary questions (Crombois 1994, pp. 24–33).
Despite initial intellectual excitement on both sides, the experiment
across political divides did not last. From around 1900 onwards, Solvay
began to reorganize his Institut. After having appointed Émile Waxweiler
(1867–1916), Solvay also started the construction of an art nouveau
building in the Leopold Park in Brussels that was to house a new Institut
de Sociologie Solvay. Waxweiler, who had been trained as an engineer
and who had been active in liberal politics in his student years, became
its director. He had also visited the USA and become impressed by the
work of Frederick Taylor on scientific management. With support from
Solvay, Waxweiler could accord grants to researchers who were willing
to explore themes that fitted the interests of Waxweiler and Solvay (see
Popelin 1986, pp. 59–67; Crombois 1995). After some bitter exchanges,
the collaboration between Solvay (and Waxweiler), on the one hand, and
Denis, De Greef and Vandervelde, on the other, came to an end (for the
official statements of both sides, see Dejongh 1901; Hanssens 1901; see
also de Bie 1983, pp. 134–140). Solvay reproached his former collabora-
tors that they had been unwilling to get rid of their ideological preju-
dices, their ‘doctrines régnantes’ (Hanssens 1901, pp. 22–23).
At the end of the nineteenth century, however, the University
of Brussels was not the only one in Belgium to introduce a social sci-
ence curriculum. In different ways, and at different places, the Catholic
University of Louvain also reacted to the late-nineteenth-century hype
surrounding sociology. In 1892, thus shortly after the ‘free-think-
ing’ University of Brussels, the Catholic University set up its School
for Political and Social Sciences. The School was closely related to the
Faculty of Law of the university. But it did not provide much place for
sociology; the School’s courses were in large part juridical and policy
oriented, directed towards the administration of the state. The theoreti-
cal ambitions of the newcomer were particularly criticized. Its director,
Jules Van den Heuvel, stated his reservations without much hesitation
in a letter, dated October 1896, to the rector magnificus of the Catholic
University: ‘At present, sociology is most often but a poor philosophy
hidden behind long quotes of picturesque customs and mores’ (cited in
Gerard 1992, p. 30).6 Some empirical research was introduced, however,
although it mainly built on the ‘monographic’ method of family-budget
studies as developed by the Catholic French social scientist Frédéric Le
Play. In the spirit of Le Play, the ‘monographs’ or case studies of the liv-
ing conditions of family households had to provide for moral exemplars
for Catholics (see Heilbron 2015, pp. 56–57). In this spirit, it was also
argued that social policy had to be based on such moral exemplars (e.g.
Brants 1906).
In the Higher Institute of Philosophy in Louvain, the social thought
of Comte and Durkheim also received some attention. The Philosophy
Institute, founded in 1889, was devoted to the revival of the philosophy
of St. Thomas Aquinas (as stimulated by Pope Leo XIII). It had the aim
to formulate a modern answer to the attacks of positivism against tra-
ditional religion and philosophy. With some support from this institute,
6 “Or la sociologie n’est le plus souvent aujourd’hui qu’une pauvre philosophie
dissimulée derrière de longues citations de coutumes et de mœurs plus ou moins

pittoresques”.
the lawyer and politician Cyrille Van Overbergh (1866–1959) founded

in December 1899 the first sociological association in Belgium, the
Société Belge de Sociologie. In order to defend and legitimize his initiative
vis-à-vis Catholic ‘philosophers’, Van Overbergh distinguished between
three types of sociology and three corresponding ‘Weltanschauungen’:
liberal, socialist and Catholic. He dismissed both the individualist (lib-
eral) and the collectivist (socialist) approach. Instead the Société Belge
de Sociologie had to further the development of Catholic sociology.
Catholicism was, in his view, both a theoretical system and a civilizational
project ‘qui s’affirme dans ses effets bienfaisants à travers dix-neuf siècles
d’histoire’ (Van Overbergh 1900, p. 179).7 On this sound basis, sociol-
ogy could be given a Catholic interpretation. In his view, it could be an
important source of inspiration for the elaboration of Catholic doctrines,
of Catholic Social Teaching. The writings of Comte and Durkheim
might even be incorporated into a Catholic, neo-Thomist criticism
of Marxist and liberal views of modern society (see Wils 2001, 2005;
Wijns 2003).
A more systematic interest in sociology emerged only gradually in
Louvain. Resistance to positivist accounts of ‘absolute truths’ remained
dominant for quite some time. But the growth of a Catholic ‘pillar’,
i.e. a network of Catholic organizations in different sectors of society
(education, health care, mass media, etc.) and for different parts of the
population (workers, farmers, women, youth, etc.), gradually led to an
increased interest in sociology. Similar expectations emerged in the sec-
ular pillars within Belgium. The ideological tensions within Belgium
left their mark on the institutionalization of sociology. The competing
Weltanschauungen dominated during the formative years of sociology
in Belgium—and much thereafter. Sociology has long remained associ-
ated with ideology, whether of secular or of Catholic orientation; this
ideologically divided landscape has heavily defined the history of sociol-
ogy within Belgium. We will deal with the structures and consequences
of these ideological tensions and cleavages in more detail in the next
chapter of this book.
7 “which shows itself in its benevolent effects throughout a history of nineteen
centuries”.
Flanders and Wallonia

In the early-twentieth century, Belgium had four universities: the state
universities in Ghent and Liège (which had both been founded by the
‘enlightened’ Dutch king in 1817) and the private ones in Louvain and
Brussels. The Catholic University of Louvain had been re-established
in 1834, i.e. shortly after Belgium’s independence; it had originally
been founded in 1425, but was abolished in 1797 under French rule.
The ‘free-thinking’ University of Brussels had also been established in
1834 and was expected to constitute an ideological counterpart to the
University of Louvain. As already indicated, the ideological tensions and
divisions within Belgium—especially between Brussels and Louvain—
had a strong impact on the early development of a broad range of aca-
demic disciplines, including sociology. In the course of the twentieth
century, however, linguistic tensions and divisions would increasingly
become important. For most disciplines, different scientific communities
would develop in Wallonia (Walloon or French) and in Flanders (Flemish
or Dutch).
Since 1830, the language of instruction in the Belgian universities had
been French, also in those institutions located on that part of its terri-
tory where most people spoke ‘Flemish Dutch’ (Louvain and Ghent).
Under political and public pressure, the University of Ghent adopted
in 1930 Dutch as the medium of instruction. Some years later both the
universities of Louvain and Brussels also started to offer courses taught
in Dutch (or Flemish). But teaching in French continued in Louvain
and Brussels. In fact, French programmes are generally considered to
have been predominant at both universities until the 1950s or 1960s
(e.g. Verhoeven 1982).
The predominant position of French reflected broader socio-eco-
nomic divergences. Social status in the entire nation-state has long
largely depended on knowledge of the French language, as Belgium was
dominated by an industrialized and powerful Walloon part and a mainly
French-speaking nobility and bourgeoisie in the Flemish part of the
country. However, the structure of the university system also contributed
to the perpetuation of the dominance of French over the majority, i.e.
the Dutch- or Flemish-speaking part of the Belgian population.
No doubt, the linguistic conflicts were intensified by the expansion of
the university system. As a consequence of the increased attendance at
the level of secondary education and the expansion of the student finance
system for higher education, the total number of university students

had started to increase at an unprecedented rate in the period after the
Second World War. However, the expansion of the Catholic University
of Louvain, which was situated in the midst of Flemish territory, brought
with it the expansion of Francophone presence on Flemish territory. This
development triggered bitter resistance in Flanders—both inside and
outside Leuven (Louvain is the French and Leuven the Dutch name of
the same city). It led in the late-1960s to the so-called Louvain ques-
tion, which brought about the fall of the Belgian government and trig-
gered a series of constitutional reforms that transformed Belgium into a
federal state based on internal language borders. The ‘Louvain question’
also led to the division of the Catholic University into two autonomous
entities, a Dutch-speaking one in Leuven and a French-speaking one
for which a new site was developed in Wallonia (Louvain-la-Neuve, i.e.
the ‘new Louvain’). To avoid new ideological conflicts, the University
of Brussels was at that time also divided into independent French and
Flemish institutions.
The division of the universities of Leuven and Brussels in 1968 was
made possible by University Expansion Acts, which allowed for the
expansion of the existing universities, as well as the creation of new
ones. The university system expanded rapidly afterwards. By the 1970s,
new universities had emerged in Antwerp, Hasselt, Brussels, Mons
and Namur, while the University of Leuven was also allowed to estab-
lish a new site in Kortrijk. As the split of the universities of Louvain and
Brussels signifies, this expansion process took place within a new political
context, within which Belgium had been divided into different language
regions, and within which the political responsibility for education was
being relegated to the regional level. In the latter part of the twentieth
century, the linguistic divisions became more prominent than the ideo-
logical ones within Belgium.
This process of expansion accompanied by linguistic partitioning
also marked the development of sociology within Belgium. The differ-
ent universities tried to outbalance each other. Collaboration at the
national level was troublesome. The first Belgian sociological association
was the aforementioned French-speaking and Catholic Société Belge de
Sociologie. It was set up in 1899 and counted 37 members at the start
of the twentieth century. But it disappeared before the First World War
when its key members became involved in other activities and contexts.
It probably did not have much impact beyond its own Catholic network.
Throughout Belgium, sociology did not fare well institutionally in the

interwar era. When a second Société Belge de Sociologie was established
shortly after the Second World War, its founding members even seem to
have been unaware of the existence of a forerunner with the same name,
as one of them later publicly testified (de Bie 1986, p. 225).8
Although the second Société was (again) a French-speaking schol-
arly association, its ideological and geographical scope was broader.
Sociologists of all four Belgian universities were involved. The main
stimulus for the establishment of the new association came from the
Social Sciences Department of UNESCO—and the funding it could dis-
tribute to national research associations and consortia (de Bie 1986, pp.
227–230). However, the interuniversity collaboration among sociolo-
gists did not last long. Ideological and linguistic differences reappeared
soon. A rivalling organization of Flemish sociologists was founded in
1962 (Organisatie voor Vlaamse Sociologen). In 1975, the Société created
a French- and Dutch-speaking division: the Association des Sociologues
Belges de Langue Française (ASBLF), on the one hand, and the Vlaamse
Vereniging voor Sociologie (VVS), on the other. Although the Société was
now meant to function as an umbrella organization at the national level
that could also take care of the link with international organizations, it
disappeared only a few years later.
Since the late 1970s, there no longer exists a national forum for soci-
ology within Belgium. There is neither a national association, nor a
national journal for sociology.9 Regular national conferences are no
longer organized, although particular ‘social challenges’ or ‘social prob-
lems’ are occasionally still used/constructed to bring together social
scientists from different parts of Belgium. In Flanders and Wallonia, soci-
ology and many other scholarly disciplines have developed in different
8 De Bie later examined the first Société Belge de Sociologie in more historical detail, espe-
cially focusing on the internal conflicts that led to its abolition. He was critical in his own
way. In his view, Cyrille Van Overbergh, the most active member of this association, was
not a real sociologist (de Bie 1988; see also Wijns 2003).
9 In this regard, Belgium is different from some other small and linguistically het-
erogeneous countries, such as Switzerland. For sociology, there does exist a multilingual
national Swiss journal of sociology: Schweizerische Zeitschrift für Soziologie / Revue Suisse de
Sociologie / Swiss Journal of Sociology, which publishes work written in German, French or
English. While we do not want to overstate the ‘unifying’ relevance of this journal for the
Swiss community of sociologists, it is evident that the absence of national communication
platforms hinders the organization of scholarly interaction at the national level.
directions. As we will see in more detail in the third and fourth chapters
of this book, different kinds of international research networks have also
become institutionalized in both linguistic communities: while French-
speaking researchers in Belgium are generally well connected with research-
ers in other French-speaking parts of the world (France, Québec), Flemish
researchers primarily orient themselves to researchers in the Netherlands,
Scandinavia and the Anglo-Saxon world (see Vanderstraeten 2010).
The linguistic divisions have become dominant in Belgium in the sec-
ond half of the last century. For most fields of study, including sociology,
there are distinct Dutch- and French-speaking communities of specialists
in Belgium. At the same time, the ideological tensions did not disappear
on both sides of the language border. Although seven universities now
offer sociology programmes in Belgium, no national research community
emerged. Both the linguistic and ideological divisions have led to a parti-
tioning of the academic system in a broad variety of scholarly disciplines.
The image of sociology in Belgium, which currently imposes itself most
forcefully, is one of a ‘provincialized’ sociology. We will trace this devel-
opment in more detail in the following chapters.
Outline of the Book

While the history of science and technology in Belgium has received
systematic attention in recent decades (e.g. Halleux et al. 2001), reflec-
tions on the history of sociology in Belgium remain scarce. Moreover,
several of the available contributions have been written for specific com-
memorative purposes, such as jubilees of particular institutes. Some have
also been written by ‘protagonists’, who look back at their own life and
career within the academia or describe the situation they have become
familiar with (e.g. Van Goethem 1947; De Jonghe 1976; Vilrokx 1977;
Dumon 1981; Voyé and Dobbelaere 1994; Coenen-Huther 2002,
2006). While these contributions are often of interest in their own right,
none of them provides a systematic sociological reflection on the history
of sociology or the social sciences within Belgium. This might also be
said about a recent compilation of biographical articles on ‘forgotten’
sociologists and anthropologists in the French-speaking part of Belgium
(published in a 2014 issue of the journal Anamnèse).
Hitherto only the ‘birth’ or ‘genesis’ of sociology in Belgium has been
described and analysed in considerable detail. Throughout a long schol-
arly career, which lasted from the 1940s until the 1980s, the sociologist
Pierre de Bie wrote extensively about the ‘early years’, albeit in an essen-
tialist vein. Despite the erudition visible in his work, his focus was on the
writings of the ‘hommes de valeur’ (men of value) in Belgian sociology
(de Bie 1986, p. 193). His main intention was to distinguish between
what was worth calling ‘sociology’ and what was not. He distinguished
between ‘le mot’ and ‘la chose’: ‘on peut trouver la chose sans le mot,
mais fréquemment aussi le mot sans la chose’ (de Bie 1985, p. 4).10
His history of the early years of Belgian sociology lacks attention to the
social and cultural conditions within which sociology could develop and
(re-)define itself. By contrast, the cultural historian Kaat Wils has in more
recent years paid more attention to the intellectual context within which
sociology ‘took off’ in Belgium. Her excellent research particularly
focuses on the influence of Comte’s positivism on Belgian sociologists in
the period around 1900 (esp. Wils 2005). Some related themes, such as
the influence of Darwinism on the ‘birth’ of sociology, have recently also
been explored by historians (De Bont 2008; see also Deferme 2007).
But work that covers the history of sociology in Belgium throughout the
twentieth century does not exist. This book intends to fill this lacuna. It
intends to offer a sociological account of the history of sociology in this
small and heterogeneous country from the nineteenth until the early-
twenty-first century.
To make sense of the development of sociology in Belgium, we
hereafter first consider in more detail the factors that differentiated the
history of sociology in Belgium from other national histories. The sec-
ond chapter is devoted to an analysis of the relation between religion
(Catholicism) and sociology. Special attention is paid to the conflicts
between clerical and anticlerical points of view, to the ways in which
social science and sociology became acceptable in Catholic circles, and
to the development of a distinct form of sociology of religion at the
Catholic universities in Leuven and Louvain-la-Neuve. The third chapter
focuses afterwards on the rise of linguistic diversity within Belgium. It
discusses, more particularly, the rise of Flemish or Dutch as a ‘legitimate’
language. As the language border was constitutionally established in the
early 1960s, the post-war expansion of the university system and of sev-
eral scientific disciplines, including sociology, took place in a regionalized
10 “One can find the thing without the word, but frequently also the word without the
thing”.
context. Different communities of Dutch- and French-speaking sociolo-

gists emerged in the latter part of the twentieth century. The third chap-
ter sketches the linguistic pluralization of sociology within Belgium.
The second and third chapters outline the sociocultural setting which
shaped the history of sociology in Belgium; they allow us to get a bet-
ter sense of the peculiarities of the Belgian tradition. But they do not
build on the idea that national traditions need to be understood within
their national context only. They rather take the critiques of ‘methodo-
logical nationalism’ into account. The focus on the differentia specifica
of Belgium, on the specific conditions under which sociological networks
could emerge, disintegrate and become re-established in Belgium, makes
it possible to combine the study of a national tradition with a broader
transnational perspective. The fourth chapter likewise aims to combine
a national with a transnational perspective. This chapter is dedicated to
an analysis of the changing network structures which characterize the
scientific communities of Dutch- and French-speaking sociologists in
Belgium. It is, more particularly, devoted to a detailed analysis of the his-
tory of the publication practices within these scientific communities. The
analyses focus, among others, on the institutionalization of publication
imperatives (‘publish or perish’!). They include the different academic
contexts in Belgium in our account of the production of sociological
work.11
In short: this study is, first, intended to document and clarify develop-
ments and historical patterns that are hitherto little known. It analyses
how specific sociocultural and academic contexts, within which sociol-
ogy’s disciplinary trajectory in Belgium took shape, help to account for
the intellectual strategies and the kinds of knowledge that have been
pursued. It sheds light on the rise of different research communities in
Belgium and the growing divergences between them, and also shows
how social science has been instrumental in constructing (our predomi-
nant view of) the social cleavages within Belgium. On the basis of a spe-
cific case study, the following chapters deal with several crucial aspects
11 It is fair to mention that this English presentation of sociology in Belgium has also
forced us to make some selections. It has, most of all, excluded the use of approaches, such
as discourse analyses of sociology handbooks, which would require lengthy quotations of
French or Dutch source materials. Altogether, however, we believe that the different chap-
ters of this book provide for a broad and balanced overview of the history of sociology in
the different, relatively isolated networks in Belgium.
of this complex interaction process. But this book also pursues a broader
aim. Its second ambition is to suggest some modifications to the way in
which the history of sociology should be conceived of. By exploring new
ways to write the history of sociology (in Belgium), this book also aims
to enhance the sociological imagination.
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Wils, K., & Rasmussen, A. (2012). Sociology in a transnational perspec-
tive: Brussels, 1890–1925. Revue Belge de Philologie et d’Histoire, 90(4),
1273–1296.
CHAPTER 2
Religion
Abstract Belgium is said to be internally divided into ideologically

defined ‘pillars’, which are isolated from each other by innumerable
organizations which exclusively serve members of their own community.
Pillarization has been discussed at length in Belgian sociology. But pil-
larization also had a strong impact on the development of sociology in
Belgium. It led to the development and institutionalization of different
sociologies within Belgium. After an overview of these differences and
their lasting impact on sociology, this chapter deals in more detail with
sociology as it was practiced by Belgian Catholics, and with the rise of
‘religious sociology’ and its gradual transformation into a sociology of
religion, i.e. of Catholicism, and eventually a sociology of religions.
Keywords Ideological cleavages · Pillarization · Institut de Sociologie

Solvay · Catholic social teaching · Religious sociology
Belgium is known for its internal divisions. During the last decades, the
linguistic tensions between the Dutch- and the French-speaking part of
the population have become very prominent. In the 1960s, clearly sepa-
rate language areas were established. Afterwards, Belgium evolved from a
unitary state to a federal state with separate regions defined by language
borders. A number of successive constitutional reforms allowed for the
regionalization of political authority in areas such as public administra-
tion, culture, education, health care, the economy, the environment,
© The Author(s) 2018 23

R. Vanderstraeten and K. Louckx, Sociology in Belgium, Sociology
Transformed, https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-55663-9_2
and so on. The academic system, too, is currently divided on the basis of
language. As we will see in more detail in the following chapters, there
nowadays exist for most academic fields of study, including sociology,
separate Dutch- and French-speaking scientific communities in Belgium.
However, Belgium is not only partitioned into separate language areas.
For a long period of time, ideological conflicts have been highly prominent
and consequential. While the language borders presently define the setting
within which most other conflicts are defined, politico-religious tensions
were predominant throughout much of the nineteenth and twentieth cen-
tury. As mentioned before, the meaning of the national motto L’union fait
la force (unity makes strength) was reinterpreted accordingly in recent dec-
ades. It is nowadays often used to claim support for the unity of French-
and Dutch-speaking people within Belgium, but it originally referred to
a national unity that transcended the ideological differences between
Catholics and Liberals (who defended freedom of religion, but who could
also be free-thinkers, i.e. freemasons and oppose Roman Catholicism).
The ideological divisions became more prominent at the end of the
nineteenth century. At that time, moreover, another secular worldview,
inspired by socialism and Marxism, had also started to gain institutional
support within Belgium. In this chapter, we will first present some theo-
retical reflections on the history of the relation between state and reli-
gion. Afterwards, we will discuss how the politico-religious divisions
were handled within the Belgian nation-state and show how the growth
of the university system and the development of sociology were condi-
tioned by these cleavages. The polarized and ‘pillarized’ social landscape
provided the context within which social science and sociology could
acquire legitimacy. It also led to the development and institutionalization
of different sociologies within Belgium. In the final sections of this chap-
ter, we will pay more attention to sociology as it was practiced by Belgian
Catholics, and to the rise of ‘religious sociology’ and its gradual trans-
formation into a sociology of religion, i.e. of Catholicism, and eventually
into a sociology of religions (plural).
State and Religion
Our current conceptions of state–church relations have a long precedent,
especially within Europe. The links between state and church became
intricate after the Protestant Reformation. The religious changes that
took place in the wake of the Protestant Reformation were accompanied
2 RELIGION 25
by protracted periods of war. The Peace of Westphalia (1648), which

brought an end to the wars of religion (which were at the same time
wars among and within states), declared that the rulers of states were to
have ultimate authority over and within their territories. They also were
to be free from interference in their internal affairs by the rulers of other
states. That autonomy or sovereignty included the right to determine
which religion would hold sway within a given political realm.
The peace treaties more particularly specified that the rulers could
assume that their subjects, i.e. the population members subject to their
authority, would adhere to their religion. The right of the sovereign rul-
ers was later expressed by the famous Latin formula cuius regio, eius reli-
gio (whose realm, his religion). Although a distinction between state and
church was maintained, the Peace of Westphalia coordinated political
and religious identity. The order of the formula actually pointed in the
direction of what we would today call the ‘regulation’ of religion by the
state. It promulgated the idea of a state religion, of ‘established’ or state
churches (Anderson 2006; Beyer 2006).
Religion was also an important factor in the decades around 1800,
when the passage took place from political entities defined by and
through their rulers to ones in principle determined by collectivities
called ‘peoples’ or ‘nations’, or when—as is often said—the idea and the
social reality of the modern nation-state started to take shape (Gellner
1983; Bayly 2004). In many regards, both social entities remained inter-
twined and interdependent. No essentialist link between religion and
nation needs to be assumed here. Instead this link may be seen to ensue
from transformations of the societal system and from the formation of
modern nation-states. Nation-states may be understood as made up of
people who regard themselves as sharing the same religious belief system.
Like languages, religions are often understood as ways of identifying
oneself and others, of naming basic social identities, of imagining both
unity and difference. In the words of Rogers Brubaker: ‘Language, reli-
gion or both are generally understood as central to or even constitutive
of most ethnic and national identifications, and they frequently serve as
the key diacritical markers, emblems or symbols of such identifications’
(2013, p. 3). Modern nation-states, in particular, have typically tried to
match a religious and linguistic community to a political one. Despite
the fact that nation-states are often forced to emphasize the separation
between state and church, national and religious (or linguistic) modes of
‘belonging’ also remain intricately linked to each other (Louckx 2017).
In self-presentations of modern nation-states, religion often figures

prominently. For the USA, some historical changes in this relation have
been emphasized by Robert Bellah, who spoke of the genesis of a ‘civil
religion’ capable of supporting and sustaining the modern American
society. Bellah (1970) drew attention, among other things, to the ref-
erences to God in presidential inaugurals and the uses of popular
expressions that invoke God (‘one nation under God’, ‘may God bless
America’, ‘in God we trust’, etc.). In a similar way, Talcott Parsons
emphasized the progressive generalization of this religious value pattern
in the American societal system. Parsons believed in ongoing interactions
and adaptations between cultural ideals (religion) and social systems. In
his late work, he did not hesitate to define the modern US American
nation-state as ‘a national community which, though of course secular
in government, still retains its religious character as a holy community in
the transformed sense of a “nation under God”’ (1978, p. 203; see also
Parsons and Platt 1973, p. 42).
However valuable these analyses, there is no need to accept the teleol-
ogy inherent in Bellah’s and Parsons’ formulations. We may rather inter-
pret such formulations as expressions of predominant self-presentations
of modern nation-states. They display how modern, secular nation-states
rely on religion to construct their proper, national identity (Bellah 1989;
see also Vanderstraeten 2013). Seen from this perspective, we may also
analyse the ways in which transformations of the nation-state and its rep-
resentations correlate with specific religious changes.
Specific historical arrangements and church–state relations may differ,
depending on the churches and states involved. The (not uncontested)
idea of an overarching American ‘civil religion’ may be taken to constitute
one particular trajectory or model. Another model is that of the explic-
itly national and ‘established’ Reformed Protestant churches of several
European countries. In many respects, the Eastern Orthodox Churches
heavily resemble this model (Kessareas 2015, 2017). In the parts of
Europe that remained Catholic, one finds somewhat similar initiatives
propagating forms of national Catholicism, such as ‘Gallicanism’ in France
(see Gough 1986). But one also finds much opposition to these initiatives,
especially under the name of ‘ultramontanism—from ultra montes, which
means ‘over the mountains’ (the Alps) to the south, where Rome is situ-
ated. The ultramontane reaction affirmed the authority of the Pope over
the temporal kingdoms of the rest of Europe; it underlined the absolute
primacy of the Pope; it eventually also led to the definition of the dogma
2 RELIGION 27
of papal infallibility at the First Vatican Council in 1870. The Catholic

modes of belonging could be at odds with the expectations put forward
at the level of the nation-state. The Catholic orientation towards Rome
could diverge from national sentiments and national orientations. In the
nineteenth and twentieth century, most conflicts between state and church
took place in the Roman Catholic parts of Europe.
The German Kulturkampf might be the most famous example of such
conflicts (Sperber 1984). But such state–church relations also played an
important role in the history of Belgium. Around 1830, as we have seen,
the unity of Belgium could not (only) be defined on the basis of lan-
guage. Despite the social prestige of French, Belgium had no common
language: variants of Dutch and French were also used in large parts of
its territory. Moreover, the territory in which the Dutch language was
rooted had been divided at the end of the sixteenth century by a border,
which also distinguished Catholics from Protestants (Calvinists). After
the collapse of Napoleonic France in 1813–1815, parts of this territory
were reunified under William I. But in 1830 the southern, Catholic half
became part of the independent Kingdom of Belgium. Despite the pres-
ence of anti-clerical and masonic sympathies, especially among members
of the liberal elites, religion could be drawn upon as an identity marker,
as a symbolic boundary. In the 1830s and 1840s, the new kingdom often
explicitly defined itself as a Catholic nation-state, which distinguished
itself from the predominantly Protestant Dutch nation-state, in which
the head of the state also was the head of the national church (Sengers
2004; Lechner 2012). In the latter half of the nineteenth century, how-
ever, politico-religious conflicts began to leave a strong imprint on the
Belgian state and its academic system.
Interestingly, social-statistical research indirectly displays how reli-
gious divergences were seen to constitute a threat to the kingdom’s
unity. The first Belgian census, organized by the homo statisticus
Adolphe Quetelet in 1846, inquired into a variety of social parameters,
including religious adherence. It was concluded that almost the entire
population (>99%) adhered to Catholicism. However, none of the fol-
lowing, ten yearly organized censuses did again include an item about
religious adherence. The inclusion of this item became too controversial
in the second half of the nineteenth century. Instead of trying to meas-
ure variants or degrees of religious adherence, the Belgian politicians
and statisticians preferred not to have to debate the relation between
the nation-state and religion. They clearly did not dare to undertake
a self-presentation of the nation-state on the basis of religion; they

did not dare to expose the ideological diversity within Belgium. They
feared the consequences of conflictual images of religious belonging-
ness. After lengthy discussions and parliamentary debates, the Belgian
statisticians and politicians simply abandoned this controversial item
(Louckx 2017).1 By excluding this item from the census, they perhaps
hoped to be able to uphold the idea (or illusion) of scientific precision
and national unity. However, important politico-religious or ideological
cleavages would soon manifest themselves in the second half of the nine-
teenth century.
Pillarization
Over the years, the ideological tensions and cleavages have been the
subject of a broad range of sociological studies. The Dutch term ‘ver-
zuiling’ (pillarization) has often been used to guide the research on the
social consequences of the politico-religious conflicts in Belgium, the
Netherlands and some other European countries (such as Austria and
Switzerland). The term expresses the idea that the population of these
small European countries is internally divided into segments or blocs,
which hold different religious and ideological beliefs and which are
effectively isolated from each other by innumerable organizations which
exclusively serve members of their own community (such as political par-
ties, trade unions, schools, hospitals, universities, youth organizations,
and sports clubs). The different pillars are thus defined as ‘societies-in-
a-society’, which are integrated on the basis of particular value commit-
ments and ‘exclusive’ organizational networks.2
In the existing literature, pillarization is often perceived as a spe-
cific answer to the more general challenges that resulted from the
1 In the next chapter, we will see how the language questions in the Belgian census
likewise threatened the unity of the state. But language questions were included into the
census until the mid-twentieth century. When the results led to severe social and political
conflict, these questions were also banned.
2 In the political literature, one also speaks of “consociationalism”. A consociational state
is defined as a state which has major internal divisions along ethnic, religious, or linguistic
lines, with none of the divisions large enough to form a majority group, but which none-
theless manages to remain stable, due to consultation among the elites of each of its major
social groups (the pioneering publication for this research tradition is Lijphart 1977). A
high degree of autonomy for each social group or segment was expected—either in the
2 RELIGION 29
‘modernization process’. The social tensions and oppositions, which fol-

lowed from this process, gave way to processes of segmentation and pil-
larization (e.g. Hellemans 1990, 2015). That these processes occurred
in a few European states, and not in others, is attributed to the het-
erogeneity of their respective populations. The Dutch sociologist Joop
Ellemers (1930–2015), who also lectured on a part-time basis at the
Free University of Brussels, for example, argued that the diversity of reli-
gious, linguistic and cultural minorities on the territories of states, such
as Belgium and the Netherlands, did not enable a strong centrally steered
policy directed at the ‘common good’ (e.g. à la France). ‘But at the
same time there was no clear majority which could absorb the minor-
ity, or minorities… This demanded special institutional arrangements, of
which Verzuiling is but one of the examples’ (Ellemers 1984, p. 131).
In Belgium (as well as in the Netherlands), ‘pillarization’ was perhaps
first and foremost triggered by conflicts over the organization of educa-
tion and schooling. In the first decades after Belgium’s independence,
religion still played an important role in elementary education. The first
Elementary School Act (1842) included religion among the compulsory
subjects; the clergy also was entitled to inspect the municipal (i.e. public)
schools. Halfway through the nineteenth century, however, the demand
for ideologically neutral public education gained force. Liberal govern-
ments also took action to ensure the so-called freedom of thought in
elementary education. On the rebound, Catholics put stress on the con-
stitutional freedom of education—and started to pay more attention to
the construction of a nation-wide network or system of Catholic schools.
Until about 1870, one can hardly speak of a systematic attempt to
construct a separate system of Catholic schools. But the opposition to
the public schools and governmental policy grew steadily, especially after
1879, when a liberal government introduced new educational legislation.
The Catholic elite reacted sharply to the perceived secularizing aspects
of the legislation. This reaction turned the school struggle into a kind
of civil war. The bishops provided the parochial priests with detailed
instructions about how to organize a boycott of the public schools.
form of territorial autonomy (federalism) or in that of cultural self-government (pillariza-

tion). For an international sociological perspective on such social cleavages, see the work of
Rokkan (e.g., Rokkan 1977).
Religious sanctions were used to force parents to send their children to

Catholic schools, and to force teachers to resign from public schools and
move over to the private ones (see Lory 1979; Vanderstraeten 2002).
Ideological conflicts, such as the school struggle, provided the impe-
tus for the construction of a Catholic pillar. From approximately 1880
onwards, Catholic organizations were established in almost every social
domain: schools, banks and insurance companies, unions of workers and
farmers, travel agencies, youth organizations, women’s groups, newspa-
pers, political parties, hospitals, etc. These Catholic organizations were
‘tightly coupled’, to use Karl Weick’s phrase. Catholic organizations
systematically referred their clients to other Catholic organizations.
This organizational coupling seemed able to ensure a lifelong enclo-
sure within Catholic institutions, within Catholic doctrines. The clergy
promoted the organization of almost the whole of Catholic life in
Catholic institutions. To legitimate its broad range of actions and reac-
tions, the Catholic elite often used the Latin expression and papal motto
Instaurare Omnia in Christo (Restore all things in Christ). Ideally every
church member had to be looked after from ‘the cradle to the grave’.
From 1884 until 1914, thus for a period of 30 years, the Belgian gov-
ernment was dominated by Catholics. In this period, much legislation
was passed that re-established the social or public role of religion and
that provided for the state-funded expansion of private organizations,
such as schools or hospitals. The expansion of the Catholic pillar also led
to the development of similar, isomorphic structures built around other
politically influential ideologies, viz. liberal and socialist networks. The
idea of ‘pillarization’ is defined accordingly. It refers to the partitioning
of the Belgian population on the basis of relatively specific ideological
or politico-religious commitments. The pillars consist of highly similar
organizational networks, but contrasting ideologies.
The university institutions in Belgium, especially the private univer-
sities in Louvain and Brussels, were incorporated into the pillars. The
Catholic University of Louvain was thought to adhere to and serve
the Catholic pillar, while the University of Brussels was expected to
support the liberal and socialist, ‘free-thinking’ pillars. The University
of Brussels also had clear ties to the masonic circles in Belgium’s capi-
tal city. The state universities in Ghent and Liège were supposed to
be ideologically ‘neutral’. However, as all of their professorial staff
was appointed by the government, ideological and political affiliations
and memberships often determined individual career trajectories. The
2 RELIGION 31
expansion of the university system in Belgium thus was clearly linked

with the expansion of the different pillars; the opportunity structures,
created by the expansion of the university system, were also marked
by processes of pillarization. Mutual distrust was institutionalized.
Clear ideological affiliations and divisions defined the setting within
which a broad range of scholarly disciplines had to take root in the
second half of the nineteenth century and during most of the twenti-
eth century.
For sociology, as we will see in more detail in the next section of this
chapter, the predominant institutional and cognitive distinction was long
one between the Catholic University of Louvain and the ‘free-thinking’
University of Brussels. The politico-religious cleavages not only facili-
tated the development of different sociological traditions in Louvain
and Brussels; pillarization also helps to explain why no relatively stable
national community of sociologists developed in Belgium in this period
of time. Different sociologies here developed largely next to one another.
Important changes in these opportunity structures also ensued from
processes of ‘de-pillarization’. The beginnings of de-pillarization in
Belgium are often linked with the 1968 ‘Louvain question’. We will
also touch upon the ‘Louvain question’ in the next chapter, as it was
the major catalyst for the separation of the Flemings and Walloons, of
the Dutch- and French-speaking communities within Belgium. But this
conflict, which led to the foundation of two monolingual Catholic uni-
versities, one in Leuven and one in a new university town in Wallonia,
dubbed Louvain-la-Neuve (New Louvain), signalled at the same time
the extent of ongoing secularization processes. It signalled the declining
hold of the church on God’s People—as well as the declining author-
ity of traditional ideologies or metanarratives in general in the ‘revolu-
tionary’ era around 1968. A large monolingual university in Leuven not
only became the symbol of the struggle of the Flemish movement. The
1968 revolt was also directed against the Church’s hierarchical struc-
tures. The growing tendency towards anti-authoritarianism was mixed
with anticlericalism. In its own perspective, Leuven now intended to
be ‘not a clerical but a Catholic university’ (Tollebeek and Nys 2006,
pp. 37–39; Vos 2008).
The ‘Louvain question’ created a greater distance between the uni-
versity and the Church authorities, which had traditionally provided the
‘senior leadership’ of the institution. In 1968, Pieter de Somer (1917–
1985) became the first layperson to be appointed rector of the Catholic
University in Leuven. His appointment had much symbolic relevance.

Until then, a long line of clerics had ‘served’ at the head of the Catholic
University of Louvain. It also was tradition to grant the rector magnificus
the title of bishop—and hence display an intimate connection between
the religious and the scientific search for truth. He was also appointed
for life by the bishops, not chosen by the members of the university. The
new lay rector symbolized the growing autonomy vis-à-vis the Church
authorities and allowed for the more visible presence of laypeople and
their interests in a variety of university programmes and centres, includ-
ing those for sociology. At the same time, the ‘Louvain question’ dis-
played and deepened tensions within the Catholic pillar. Other social
‘identifiers’ also manifested themselves.
In the latter part of the twentieth century, the pillars largely fell apart.
Tight coupling was replaced with loose coupling. In the Catholic pil-
lar, the declining impact of the Church became clearly visible, result-
ing in remarkably different participation rates across organizations. The
increasing inclusion of laypersons also allowed for more ideological tol-
erance and pluralism (Vanderstraeten 1999, 2002). As we will see, de-
pillarization provided for new opportunity structures for sociology and
various other scholarly disciplines. With regard to sociology in Belgium,
we can relatively easily distinguish between three phases of its expan-
sion and institutionalization: in the era around 1900, 1960 and 2010,
respectively. Especially for the first two of these phases, (de-)pillarization
structured the range of available options or opportunities. Although the
choices that were/are made by researchers are of course dependent on
a range of other resources and propensities, we cannot understand the
historical trajectories of the different sociologies within Belgium without
taking these ideological cleavages into account.
Different Sociologies
As already indicated, the early reception of sociology within Belgium
cannot be reduced to a simple opposition: to a favourable attitude in
the liberal and socialist (‘free-thinking’) circles around the University of
Brussels and an unfavourable one in the Catholic networks around the
University of Louvain. There existed diverging attitudes towards soci-
ology in Brussels and in Louvain. In general, however, there was more
openness towards sociology among positivist, ‘free-thinking’ intellectuals
2 RELIGION 33
in Brussels. Until the mid-twentieth century, sociology generally laboured

under a bad reputation in the Catholic networks. Often preference was
here also given to the term ‘social science’, as Comte’s neologism ‘sociol-
ogy’ was widely associated with positivism and socialism.
In Brussels, Hector Denis and Guillaume De Greef initially were
the main defenders of sociology. They both opted for a positivist and
materialist approach of socio-economic phenomena.3 Both were also
strongly oriented towards France. They closely collaborated with René
Worms’ Institut International de Sociologie and its journal, the Revue
Internationale de Sociologie; Denis and De Greef became board mem-
bers of the Institut and joined the editorial team of the Revue. To attract
lecturers for the Université Nouvelle, De Greef would also heavily rely
on Worms’ network (for a detailed discussion of the internationalism of
Brussels sociology, see Wils and Rasmussen 2012).
But the dissident Université Nouvelle in Brussels itself could not
provide much structural support for the development of sociology in
Brussels; this institution also did not survive the First World War. More
support came from the Institut des Sciences Sociales and the Institut de
Sociologie Solvay. Both research institutes were founded and financed by
Ernest Solvay, who had made a personal fortune in industrial chemis-
try. In the Institut des Sciences Sociales, Solvay initially collaborated with
Denis and De Greef, as well as with Émile Vandervelde.4 The collabo-
ration between the liberal entrepreneur and these socialists/sociologists
did not last long, however. In 1901, Solvay entrusted the direction of
the newly established Institut de Sociologie Solvay to the ‘social engi-
neer’ Émile Waxweiler, who was ideologically much closer to himself
(Bertrams et al. 2013, pp. 97–118; Seguin 2014).
Solvay had far-reaching scientific and social ambitions. He founded
and financed two other research institutes in Brussels: one for physiology
3 Denis was also politically active; he was a socialist member of Parliament for nearly two
decades. In his writings, he time and again argued against Adam Smith’s idea of an “invis-
ible hand”. Sociological analyses were in his view needed to inform state interventions,
as only the state was able to ensure liberty and solidarity within the social organism (e.g.
Denis 1919, p. 59; see also Deferme 2007, pp. 180–186).
4 Vandervelde later held several posts in the Belgian government. He was Chairman
of the International Socialist Bureau from 1900 to 1918 and President of the Belgian
Workers’ Party from 1928 to 1938. Since 1946, the research institute of the Belgian (now
Walloon) Labour Party is called the Institut Émile Vandervelde.
and anatomy, and one for physics and chemistry. He also acquired con-
siderable international fame with these initiatives: among the participants
of the first (invitation-only) Solvay Conference on Physics in Brussels
in 1911, for example, were scholars such as Hendrik Lorentz, Marie
Skłodowska-Curie, Henri Poincaré, Max Planck and Albert Einstein.
Solvay hoped to play a similar role with regard to the development of
sociology. The prestigious, somewhat eclectic art nouveau building of
the new institute was constructed on a hillside in the Leopold Park of
Brussels near Solvay’s institute of physiology and anatomy. The build-
ing and its location expressed the importance Solvay accorded to soci-
ology around the turn of the century; sociologists and natural scientists
were to be treated on the same footing. Despite his efforts, however, the
Brussels Institut de Sociologie Solvay did not achieve the fame that Solvay
had hoped for.
An important part of the activities of the Institut was directed
towards the distribution of sociological knowledge. At that time,
Belgium generally aimed to play a key role in the international diffu-
sion and organization of the world’s knowledge; it tried to make of uni-
versalism a national specialization (Wils and Rasmussen 2012, p. 1294).
Illustrative is the work of the Belgian ‘documentalists’ Paul Otlet and
Henri La Fontaine, which was also supported by Solvay.5 In much
the same spirit, the Institut created a bibliographical journal, titled
Intermédiaire Sociologique, which aimed at the worldwide diffusion of
sociological knowledge. This journal was also intended to operate as a
‘sociological intermediary’ that could bring together researchers inter-
ested in sociology. The members and collaborators of the Institut were
repeatedly listed in publications of the Institut. Just before the outbreak
of the First World War, the list included people as diverse (and well
known) as John Dewey, Alfred L. Kroeber, Karl Lamprecht, Bronislaw
Malinowski, Vilfredo Pareto, George Sarton, Joseph Schumpeter,
Edward L. Thorndike, Arnold Van Gennep and René Worms. On the
5 Among others, Otlet and La Fontaine established the Office International de
Bibliographie Sociologique in Brussels in 1893. In 1910, they created the Mundaneum,

which aimed to gather all the world’s knowledge and classify it according to a system they
had developed themselves. Otlet and La Fontaine were also peace activists, who believed
that knowledge could help solidify a new world order. La Fontaine won the Nobel Peace
Prize in 1913. At present, Google conceives of the work of Otlet and La Fontaine as a fore-
runner of present-day electronic search engines, such as Google itself.
2 RELIGION 35
other hand, however, Durkheim and well-known Durkheimians were

not listed as collaborators. The ‘individualistic’ and ‘energetic’ approach
favoured within the Institut was indeed very different from Durkheim’s,
according to which social facts and collective representations consti-
tuted basic categories for sociology.6
Waxweiler’s research programme for the Institut de Sociologie was pre-
sented in his Esquisse d’une Sociologie (Sketch of a Sociology). Waxweiler
here defined sociology as ‘social ethology’, a concept he had borrowed
from the French biologist Alfred Giard. Just like biologists study the
adaptation of organisms to their environment, sociologists had to inves-
tigate how individuals adapt to their specific environment and to each
other. Sociologists had ‘to cling to the individual’; they had to focus
on the development of the ‘social energy’ of the individual (Waxweiler
1906, pp. 17–40). Waxweiler also made a plea for a comparative sociol-
ogy, which addressed adaptation processes in different species, viz. ani-
mals and humans (defined as ‘rational animals’). Altogether, he time and
again argued that sociology needed support from biology and psychol-
ogy (Crombois 1998; De Bont 2008).7
Waxweiler’s approach was close to that of Ernest Solvay. For Solvay,
the Institut had to operate as an independent laboratory for sociological
research. He tried to establish the Institut as a place where researchers
could screen themselves from ideological controversies and political dis-
putes. At the same time, however, Solvay also emphasized that the focus
of the Institut could not only be on ‘pure’ scientific work. It also, if not
predominantly, had to focus on ‘the application of scientific research
methods to contemporary social and economic problems’. Solvay dis-
tinguished between two goals, viz. ‘a theoretical part: understanding
6 Waxweiler did not engage in a discussion with Durkheim. Following Pierre de Bie
(1986, p. 194), Waxweiler’s sociology was characterized by “une superbe ignorance” of

Durkheim’s work.
7 Darwinism and biology inspired more sociologists at that time. In Belgium, Jules
Dallemagne had presented a strong version of bio-sociology in his Principes de Sociologie.

For him, sociology had to study the ways in which animals use other animals to ensure
the survival of themselves and of their species. In his words: “La sociologie est donc …
l’ensemble des modes selon lesquels l’animal utilise l’animal pour maintenir la conservation
de son individu et celle de l’espèce” (Dallemagne 1886, p. 50). One can, of course, also
think of the “biological sociology” propagated by René Worms.
sociological matter from an energetic point of view and a practical part:

conducting social reform from a productivist point of view’.8
The Institut accorded grants to researchers who were willing to
explore themes that fitted with the interests of Waxweiler and Solvay. As
a result, different (groups of) people worked around different, relatively
loosely coupled topics (Popelin 1986, pp. 59–67; Crombois 1995). In a
more general way, the benefits and problems of comparative research—
comparing cultures across time periods and/or places—were frequently
debated within the Institut. In this context, Belgium’s colonial project
in Africa was actively, though not uncritically, supported.9 A study group
on the perfectibility of the ‘primitive mind’ in Congo was set up in 1910.
Émile Vandervelde, who had already played a major role in the campaign
against Leopold II’s empire (the Congo Free State), became one of its
most active members. Several expeditions were also organized to address
ethnographic and colonial questions, such as the development of a ‘colo-
nial doctrine’ for the Belgian government.
Waxweiler’s ethological approach is visible in the discussions of this
research group. The ‘negroes’ were thought to be adapted to their envi-
ronment; a ‘primitive mind’ was sufficient in the absence of more chal-
lenging demands, of generations of civilization. However, as all human
organisms were considered to be adaptable to their environment, it was
8 The quotations are taken from the programme statement in the first issue of the Revue
de l’Institut de Sociologie, the official journal of the Institut Solvay, which started to appear
after the First World War. This statement reads as follows: “Dans la pensée de son fon-
dateur, l’Institut de Sociologie devait non seulement contribuer au progrès des sciences
sociales, mais encore encourager et organiser l’application des méthodes d’investigation et
d’enseignement de la science moderne aux problèmes économiques et sociaux qui domi-
nent les préoccupations contemporaines. Pour assurer la réalisation de ses intentions, M. E.
Solvay fixa lui-même, sans exclure les travaux scientifiques d’inspiration différente, un plan
d’orientation sociologique comportant une partie théorique: l’appréhension de la matière
sociologique du point de vue énergétique, et une partie pratique: la conduite de la réforme
sociale du point de vue productiviste” (1920, pp. 5–6).
9 At the beginning of the twentieth century, the Congo Free State was a personal colony
of Leopold II, the King of Belgium. But the system of economic exploitation led to intense
diplomatic pressure on the Belgian state to take official control of the country. Belgium
finally did so in 1908, creating the Belgian Congo. In his early, ‘journalistic’ writings,
Robert E. Park was among the first to attack Leopold’s depredations in the Congo Free
State (see Lyman 1992). While Park referred at times to Vandervelde, we have not been
able to find systematic links between the work conducted in the Institut and what later
became Chicago sociology.
Another random document with
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barruntado su propósito, por ser
aquella parte visitada muchas
veces de las Ninfas; á lo cual dixo
Siralvo desta suerte: Yendo por el
cerrado valle de los fresnos hacia
las fuentes del Obrego como dos
millas de allí, acabado el valle
entre dos antiguos allozares,
mana una fuente abundantíssima,
y á poco trecho se deja bajar por
la aspereza de unos riscos de
caída extraña, donde por
tortuosas sendas fácilmente
puede irse tras el agua, la cual en
el camino va cogiendo otras
cuarenta fuentes perenales que
juntas con extraño ruido van por
entre aquellas peñas
quebrantándose, y llegando á
topar el otro risco soberbias le
pretenden contrastar; mas
viéndose detenidas, llenas de
blanca espuma, tuercen por
aquella hondura cavernosa como
á buscar el centro de la tierra; á
pocos pasos en lo más estrecho
está una puente natural por
donde las aguas passando, casi
corridas de verse assí oprimir,
hacen doblado estruendo, y al fin
de la puente hay una angosta
senda que, dando vuelta á la
parte del risco, en aquella soledad
descubre al Mediodía un verde
pradecillo de muchas fuentes
pero de pocas plantas, y entre
ellas de viva piedra cavada está
la cueva del Mago Erión, albergue
ancho y obrado con suma
curiosidad. Este es el solo lugar
que os conviene, porque el
secreto dél es grande y el
apartamiento no es mucho. ¿Qué
podréis allá pedir que no halléis?
Todo está lleno de caza y de
frescura, y aunque es visitado
continuamente de las bellas
Ninfas, no es lugar común á todos
como el bosque del Pino, pues la
compañía de Erión seros ha muy
agradable. Éste sabe en los cielos
desde la más mínima estrella
hasta el mayor planeta su
movimiento y virtud; en los aires
sus calidades y en las aves dél y
alimañas de la tierra lo mismo; en
la mar tiene fuerza de enfrenar
sus olas y levantar tempestades
hasta poner sobre las aguas las
arenas: la división de las almas
irracionales y la virtud de la
inmortal con profundíssimo saber.
Pues llegando á los abismos las
tres Furias á su canto, Alecto
tiembla, Tesifón gime y Megera se
humilla; Plutón le obedece y los
dañados salen á la menor de sus
voces. Pues de las penas de
amor, sin hierba ni piedra, con
sólo su canto hace que ame el
amado ó aborrezca el aborrecido;
y si le viene la gana vuelto en
lobo se va á los montes, y hecho
águila á los aires, tornado pez
entra por las aguas, y convertido
en árbol se aparece en los
desiertos; no tiene Dios desde las
aguas del cielo á las ínfimas del
olvido cosa que no conozca por
nombre y naturaleza; no es de
condición áspera ni de trato
oculto; allí recibe á quien le busca
y remedia á quien le halla. Aquí
podemos irnos que en probarlo se
pierde poco, y yo sé que el ser
bien recebidos está cierto.
Cardenio, como de la ribera había
estado tanto tiempo ausente,
quedó admirado del gran saber
del nuevo Erión; pero Mendino,
que dél y de su estancia tenía
mucha noticia, aunque pudiera
desde el Mago Sincero estar
escarmentado, fácilmente dando
crédito á sus loores, determinó
que le buscassen el siguiente día
por poner aquél en cobro lo que
les importaba dexar, que fué
fácilmente hecho, y recogiéndose
á las cabañas de Mendino,
pusieron orden en la cena, que
fué de mucho gusto, y al fin della
no faltó quien se le acrecentasse,
porque vinieron Batto y Silvano,
pastores conocidíssimos, ambos
mozos y ambos de grande
habilidad, á buscar juez á ciertas
dudas que Batto sentía de versos
de Silvano; y el juicio de Siralvo
fué que si todos los poetas
fuessen calumniados, pocos
escaparían de algún objeto; y
colérico Silvano, en un momento
puso mil á Batto, y de razón en
razón se desafiaron á cantar en
presencia de aquellos pastores,
pero pareciéndoles la noche
blanda y el aire suave, se salieron
juntos á tomarle y oirlos á la
fresca fuente: donde sentados
sacaron la lira y el rabel, á cuyo
son assí cantó Silvano y assí fué
Batto respondiendo:
SILVANO
Dime que Dios te dé para un
pellico,
¿por qué traes tan mal
vestido, Batto,
presumiendo tu padre de tan
rico?
BATTO
Porque el pastor de mi
nobleza y trato
no ha menester buscarlo en el
apero,
que una cosa es el hombre y
otra el hato.
Mas dime, esse capote
dominguero
¿quién te le dió? ¿Quizá
porque cantasses
en tanto que comía el
compañero?
SILVANO
Si á quien yo le canté tú le
bailasses,
yo sé, por más que de rico te
alabes,
si te diesse otro á ti, que le
tomasses.
Mas ¿por qué culpas tales y
tan graves
de Lisio traes sus rimas
desmandadas,
de lengua en lengua que
ninguna sabes?
BATTO
Calla y sabrás: ¿no ves
cuán aprobadas
del mundo son las mías y la
alteza
de mis líricas odas imitadas?
Tú tienes por tesoro tu
pobreza,
y si lo es, está tan escondido
que para descubrirle no hay
destreza.
SILVANO
Pastor liviano, ¿qué libro
has leído
que de ti pueda nadie hacer
caso,
si no estuviesse fuera de
sentido?
El franco Apolo fué contigo
escaso,
y por hacerte de sus
paniaguados,
no te echarán á palos del
Parnasso.
BATTO
Desso darán mis versos
levantados
el testimonio y de mi poesía
sin ser como los tuyos
acabados.
En diciendo fineza y
hidalguía,
regalo, gusto y
entretenimiento,
diosa, bizarro trato y gallardía.
SILVANO
¡Oh, qué donoso
desvanecimiento!
Dessos vocablos uso, Batto
mío,
porque son tiernos y me dan
contento,
Pero las partes por do yo los
guío,
son tan diversas todas y tan
buenas,
que ellas lo dicen, que yo no
porfío.
BATTO
¿Sabes lo que nos dicen?
Que van llenas
de muy bajas razones su
camino,
y si algunas se escapan son
ajenas,
Y no hurtáis, Silvano, del
latino,
del griego ó del francés ó del
romano,
sino de mí y del otro su
vecino.
SILVANO
Si tu trompa tomassen en la
mano,
que la de Lisio apenas lo
hiciste,
¿qué son harías, cabrerizo
hermano?
Para vaciarla el sueño no
perdiste,
para cambiarla sí, que no
hallaste
otro tanto metal como fundiste.
BATTO
¡Basta! que tú en la tuya
granjeaste
de crédito y honor ancho
tesoro;
mas dime si en mis Rimas
encontraste
La copla ajena entera sin
decoro,
ó espuelas barnizadas de
gineta,
con jaez carmesí y estribos de
oro.
SILVANO
Descubriréte á la primera
treta
tu lengua sin artículos, defeto
digno de castigar por nueva
seta.
Tu nombre es Piedra
toque y en efeto,
usando descubrir otros
metales,
el miserable tuyo te es
secreto.
BATTO
¡Oh tú, que con irónicas
señales,
cansas los sabios, frunces los
misérrimos,
viviendo por pensión de los
mortales!
SIRALVO
Pastores, dos poetas
celebérrimos
no han de tratarse assí, que
es caso ilícito
motejarse en lenguajes tan
acérrimos.
Ni á vosotros, amigos, os es
lícito,
ni á mi sufrirlo, y es razón
legítima,
que ande el juez en esto más
solícito.
La honra al bueno es cordial
epítima,
y los nobles conócense en la
plática,
dándose el uno por el otro en
vítima.
Aquí, donde la hierba es
aromática,
con el sonido de la fuente
harmónica,
al claro rayo de la luz
scenática,
Suene Silvano, nuestra lira
jónica,
Batto rosponda el rabelejo
dórico
y duerma el Jovio con su dota
Crónica.
Cada cual es poeta y es
histórico,
y cada cual es cómico y es
trágico,
y aun cada cual gramático y
retórico.
Pero dexado, en un cantar
selvático,
si aquí resuena Lúcida y
Tirrena,
más mueve un tierno son que
un canto mágico.
SILVANO
En hora buena, pero con tal
pato
si pierde Batto, que esté llano
y cierto,
que por concierto deste
desafío,
ha de ser mío su rabel de
pino;
y si benino Apolo se le allana,
y en él se humana para que
me gane,
que yo me allane y sin desdén
ó ira
le dé mi lira de ciprés y
sándalos.
BATTO
No hagas más escándalos,
satírico,
ni presumas de lírico y
bucólico;
con algún melancólico lunático
te precias tú de plático en
poética;
que esté su lira ética y él ético,
que mi rabel poético odorífero
no entrará en tan pestífero
catálogo
ni en tal falso diálogo ni
cántico.
SIRALVO
Si estilo nigromántico
bastasse
á poder sossegar vuestra
contienda,
tened por cierto que lo
procurasse,
O callad ambos ó tened la
rienda,
ó poned premios ó cantad sin
ellos,
pero ninguno en su cantar se
ofenda.
SILVANO
Dos chivos tengo, y huelgo
de ponellos,
para abreviar en el presente
caso,
contento de ganallos ó
perdellos.
BATTO
Pues yo tengo, Siralvo, un
rico vaso
que á mi opinión es de
ponerse dino
con las riquezas del soberbio
Crasso.
El pie de haya, el tapador de
pino,
de cedro el cuerpo y de
manera el arte,
que excede el precio del metal
más fino.
Dédalo le labró parte por
parte,
tallando en él del uno al otro
polo,
cuanto el cielo y el sol mira y
reparte.
Y cuando en tanta
hermosura violo,
fuese por Delfos, y passando
á Anfriso,
dióle al santo pastor el rubio
Apolo.
Y cuando al carro
trasponerse quiso
el retor de la luz, dejó el
ganado
y aqueste vaso con mayor
aviso,
Á las Ninfas del Tajo
encomendado;
y ellas después le dieron á
Silvana,
de quien mi padre fué pastor
preciado.
Ella á él y él á mí; mas si me
gana
Silvano, ahora quiero que le
lleve.
SIRALVO
Y yo juzgaros con entera
gana.
Batto á pagar y á no reñir
se atreve,
y tú, Silvano mío, bien te
acuerdas
que has prometido lo que aquí
se debe.
Pues fregad la resina por las
cerdas,
muestren las claras voces su
dulzura
al dulce son de las templadas
cuerdas.
Sentémonos ahora en la
verdura;
cantad ahora que se va
colmando
de flor el prado, el soto de
frescura.
Ahora están los árboles
mostrando,
como de nuevo, un año
fertilíssimo,
los ganados y gentes
alegrando.
Ahora viene el ancho río
puríssimo,
no le turban las nieves, que el
lozano
salce se ve en su seno
profundíssimo.
Descubrid vuestro ingenio
mano á mano,
cada cual cante con estilo
nuevo,
comience Batto, seguirá
Silvano,
diréis á veces, gozaráse Febo.
BATTO
¡Oh, rico cielo, cuya eterna
orden
es claro ejemplo del poder
divino,
haz que mis versos y tu honor
concorden!
SILVANO
Para que deste premio sea
yo dino
en mis enamorados
pensamientos,
muéstrame, Amor, la luz de tu
camino.
BATTO
Lleven los frescos y suaves
vientos
mis dulces versos á la cuarta
esfera,
pues ama el mismo Apolo mis
acentos.
SILVANO
Dichoso yo si Lúcida
estuviera
tras estos verdes ramos
escuchando,
y oyéndose nombrar me
respondiera.
BATTO
Pues no me canso de vivir
penando,
la que me está matando,
debría templar un poco de mi
pena.
Ablándate, dulcíssima
Tirrena,
que siendo en todo buena,
no es justo que te falte el ser
piadosa.
SILVANO
Pues cuando te me
muestras amorosa,
Lúcida mía hermosa,
muy humilde te soy, seime
benina.
Regala, diosa, esta ánima
mezquina,
que mi fineza es dina
de que tu gallardía me
entretenga.
BATTO
Si quiere Amor que mi vivir
sostenga,
de Tirrena me venga
el remedio, que es malo de
otra parte.
Mira que de mi pecho no se
parte,
Tirrena, por amarte,
un Etna fiero, un Mongibelo
ardiente.
SILVANO
Si yo dijesse la que mi alma
siente,
cuando me hallo ausente,
de tu grande beldad, Lúcida
mía,
Etnas y Mongibelos helaría,
porque su llama es fría,
con la que abrasa el pecho de
Silvano.
BATTO
Cuando en mi corazón
metió la mano,
sin dejarme entendello,
robóme Amor la libertad con
ella,
dejando en lugar della
el duro yugo que me oprime el
cuello.
SILVANO
El duro yugo que me oprime
el cuello,
por blando le he tenido
llevado del dulzor de mi
deseo,
por quien de Amor me veo
menos pagado y más
agradecido.
BATTO
Menos pagado y más
agradecido,
Amor quiere que muera,
quiéralo él, que yo también lo
quiero,
y veráse, si muero,
cuánto mi fe, pastora, es
verdadera.
SILVANO
Cuánto mi fe, pastora, es
verdadera
es falsa mi esperanza,
porque mejor entrambas me
deshagan,
y aunque ellas no la hagan,
nunca mi corazón hará
mudanza.
BATTO
Tirrena mía, más blanca que
azucena,
más colorada que purpúrea
rosa,
más dura y más helada
que blanca y colorada;
si no te precias de aliviar mi
pena,
hazlo al menos de ser tan
poderosa,
que queriendo tus ojos
acabarme,
con ellos mismos puedas
remediarme.
SILVANO
Lúcida mía, en cuya
hermosura
están juntas la vida con la
muerte,
el miedo y la esperanza,
tempestad y bonanza,
sin duda á aquél que de tu
Amor no cura
darás vida, esperanza y buena
suerte,
pues por amarte, Lúcida, me
han dado
la muerte el miedo y el
adverso hado.
BATTO
¿Di, quién, recién nacido
de un animal doméstico
preciado,
del todo está crecido,
de padre sensitivo fué
engendrado,
mas nació sin sentido
y en esto su natura ha
confirmado;
después, materna cura,
muda su sér, su nombre y su
figura?
SILVANO
Di tu, ¿quién en dulzura
nace, y en siendo della
dividida,
la llega su ventura
á otra cosa, que teniendo vida
muere ella y si procura
vivir, queda la otra apetecida,
haciendo su concierto,
del muerto vivo y del vivo
muerto?
BATTO
El canto se ha passado
querellándonos,
de aquellas inhumanas que,
ofendiéndonos,
quedan sin culpa con el mal
pagándonos.
SILVANO
Al principio pensé que,
defendiéndonos,
tan solos nuestros premios
procuráramos,
menos desseo y más passión
venciéndonos.
SIRALVO
Pastores, mucho más os
escucháramos,
aunque en razones no sabré
mostrároslo,
porque de oiros nunca nos
cansáramos.
Ponerme yo en mis Rimas á
loároslo,
por más que lo procure
desvelándome,
no será más possible que
premiároslo.
BATTO
Pues yo, Siralvo, pienso,
que premiándome,
saldrás de aquessa deuda
conociéndote,
y en tu saber y mi razón
fiándome.
SILVANO
Yo no pienso cansarte
persuadiéndote
á lo que tú, Siralvo mío,
obligástete,
y la justicia clara está
pidiéndote.
SIRALVO
Batto, de tal manera
señalástete,
de suerte tus cantares
compusístelos,
que de tu mano con tu loor
premiástete.
Y tú, Silvano, tanto
enriquecístelos
tus conceptos de amor, que
deste premio
como de cosa humilde
desviástelos.
Por esto sin gastar largo
proemio,

Sociology in Belgium A Sociological History 1St Edition Raf Vanderstraeten All Chapter

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Sociology in Belgium: A Sociological

History 1st Edition Raf Vanderstraeten

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Library of Congress Control Number: 2017947735

© The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s) 2018

Cover illustration: © saulgranda/Getty

Printed on acid-free paper

This Palgrave Pivot imprint is published by Springer Nature

Fig. 3.1 Number of French- and Dutch-speaking sociology

sociology. It aims to come to a better self-understanding of sociology in

Abstract This chapter starts with a sketch of the sociopolitical context

Keywords Social statistics · Adolphe Quetelet · Institut de Sociologie

We can only acquire an understanding of sociology as it developed

© The Author(s) 2018 1

French-speaking scientific communities in the period after the Second

L’Union Fait La Force?

Southern or Catholic Netherlands, which comprised most of present-

with approximately 58% of the population, the official language is Dutch,

carried practical and reformist connotations as a ‘rational’ guide to

The nineteenth-century rise of administrative statistics, in Belgium

chapter of the first book of Das Kapital (Marx 1867).

interest. The openness towards sociology in academic circles in Belgium

Brussels and Louvain

to the sociopolitical problems of modern, industrializing states. Its

4 “A l’heure actuelle, l’union du socialisme et de la science positive est un fait accompli; il

6 “Or la sociologie n’est le plus souvent aujourd’hui qu’une pauvre philosophie

dissimulée derrière de longues citations de coutumes et de mœurs plus ou moins

the lawyer and politician Cyrille Van Overbergh (1866–1959) founded

7 “which shows itself in its benevolent effects throughout a history of nineteen

Flanders and Wallonia

system for higher education, the total number of university students

Throughout Belgium, sociology did not fare well institutionally in the

Outline of the Book

context. Different communities of Dutch- and French-speaking sociolo-

Dejongh, C. (1901). Note pour MM. De Greef, Denis et Vandervelde. Brussels:

Heilbron, J. (2015). French sociology. Ithaca: Cornell University Press.

Van Goethem, F. (1947). De herdenking van het vijftigjarig bestaan der

Abstract Belgium is said to be internally divided into ideologically

Keywords Ideological cleavages · Pillarization · Institut de Sociologie

© The Author(s) 2018 23

by protracted periods of war. The Peace of Westphalia (1648), which

In self-presentations of modern nation-states, religion often figures

of papal infallibility at the First Vatican Council in 1870. The Catholic

a self-presentation of the nation-state on the basis of religion; they

‘modernization process’. The social tensions and oppositions, which fol-

form of territorial autonomy (federalism) or in that of cultural self-government (pillariza-

Religious sanctions were used to force parents to send their children to

expansion of the university system in Belgium thus was clearly linked

University in Leuven. His appointment had much symbolic relevance.

in Brussels. Until the mid-twentieth century, sociology generally laboured

5 Among others, Otlet and La Fontaine established the Office International de

Bibliographie Sociologique in Brussels in 1893. In 1910, they created the Mundaneum,

other hand, however, Durkheim and well-known Durkheimians were

(1986, p. 194), Waxweiler’s sociology was characterized by “une superbe ignorance” of

Dallemagne had presented a strong version of bio-sociology in his Principes de Sociologie.

sociological matter from an energetic point of view and a practical part:

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Fig. 3.1 Number of French- and Dutch-speaking sociology