Talk:Municipalities in Belgium

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Is there a difference between municipalities and cities in this context? If so, the difference should be explained. If not, it should be moved to List of cities in Belgium, which is the standard. Tokerboy

It is different. A municipality is a subdivision of a province, while a city, I think, is a large built-up area. - Patrick 00:49 Feb 6, 2003 (UTC)

I'm not sure I understand, but ok... I'll leave it here under the assumption that a completely different list (including Brussels and whatnot) will eventually be placed at List of cities in Belgium. (not saying you should do it, Patrick, just that it wouldn't be a non sequitur to have both articles in existence) Tokerboy

To be more precise, a municipality is the smallest administrative unit in Belgium. It is generally made up of a city and a few towns, or solely of a number of towns. A large built-up area is mostly, but not necessarily, a city. For example: the municipality of Brussels is made up of the city of Brussels and the towns of Haren, Laken and Neder-over-Heembeek. D.D. 09:15 Feb 6, 2003 (UTC)

1. A city, at least in the Lower Countries, is a town that once obtained city rights, it is a rather historical concept but it would still be considered offensive if a city would be called a town. Some cities are very small (e.g. Damme) and today of little importance (besides attracting tourists to gastronomical restaurants), some towns are quite large agglomerations which theoretically can be very important - though a sense of tradition might have influenced decisions about official institutions to remain or novel institutions to become connected to a city - or even to give modern city rights to the large town, such as Genk in... 2000. A municipality is indeed an administrative unit, it does not need to contain any city, or even - as far as one may consider a town as larger than a village - any town.

2. The example of the municipality of Brussels versus the city of Brussels may be rather unfortunately chosen: The City of Brussels is now regularly used as identical to the municipality (an expansion of a once municipal city to include some minor towns should not cause the City Hall to loose its title) ; moreover, the Belgian Constitution mentions the city of Brussels as its capital, one understands this as referring to the whole Brussels Capital Region - 19 municipalies - based on the small character c in city, a capitalized C would than have indicated the name of the single municipality... (see also City of Brussels) User:213.224.87.185 2006-05-23

Legally speaking there is no distinction in Belgium between a commune, a town, a municipallity, a city or whatever you may want to call it. As stated before: 'City' is an honorary title. There is one criterium though: If 'a place' can prove, with historic documents, that it is at least a thousand (1000) years old then it is granted the 'title' of city. Much debate, however, has gone into the question wheter or not it has to be continually habited during that 1000 year period. Many places fell into desolation during the dark ages or the late middle-ages (Plague). Example: Tongeren (Tongrorum in Latin sources) was an important centre during Roman times, but did it exist a.d. 1000?81.246.156.148

Another example: In 1964 Ostend was granted the title of 'City' (It is the ministry of the interior, like the 'Home-office' in G.B., who grants those titles). Historical documents showed that in a.d. 964 the place had been sacked (A late exploit of the Vikings). But then: No written documents about Ostend anymore - for more than a century long; so? 81.246.156.148 00:36, 8 July 2006 (UTC)

Contents 1 Merger issues 2 Standardization of the lists of municipalities 3 Move 4 Cities and ... municipalities?

[edit] Merger issues

On one of the other belgium articles, (Breendonk), an editor wants to mention that the mergers of 19778-83 were not without significant opposition; however there does not seem to be a cite available other than this editor's WP:OR and own experience. Can anyone who is working on this article provide any input to this question, perhaps adddress it on the appropriate section in this article?Bridesmill 02:09, 23 July 2006 (UTC)

Please be sure to make the difference between the general feeling in Belgium about the mergers, and anyting specific for Breendonk. I know (OR) that many of the mergers were disputed, but that doesn't mean that that was the case in all villages, and even less that it was a general feeling (it could e.g. have been a vocal minority protesting and thus getting media attention). (For the record: I'm involved in the Breendonk dispute, as the main editor that wants to remove the mention) Fram 19:52, 24 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Standardization of the lists of municipalities

There is a discussion about an eventual standardization of all the lists of municipalities. Please join here and express your opinions.--Húsönd 19:46, 21 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Move

Shouldn't this page be moved to Municipalities of provinces of regions of Belgium ?--83.182.197.215 16:35, 15 October 2006 (UTC)

Is this my first sign of clearvoyance? It does not happen very often that I give an answer ('No') hours before a question is put. See my comment of 15 Oct 2006 12:46-14:57 (UTC) in a section of a talk page on provinces. (Copy of my reply on your identical question on that talk page). — SomeHuman 15 Oct 2006 17:24 (UTC)

[edit] Cities and ... municipalities?

In Belgium, we don't have municipalities, it is french-republican-oriented. We do have communes, like Luxemburg.

For the city, it is simple : it is just a honorific status given to some communes. This page I wrote should be a little explanation : City status in Belgium.

Cheers, David Descamps 09:31, 26 December 2006 (UTC)

Actually, the term commune also comes from the French: the concept has been defined during the French occupation of Belgium (1792-1815), when also the provinces were defined as departments. In Belgium, the term municipality has no official meaning either in French of Dutch. All municipalities are communes (called commune in French, gemeente in Dutch), with some having the title of city. I suppose the word municipality in this article is used as translation for commune. Otherwise, this word could be used as well. LHOON 09:46, 26 December 2006 (UTC)

Municipalité is typically republican, it has also in France another meaning than commune (the legislative power of the commune). We do not have municipalities in Belgium. The appropriate name is Commune. The name is from the Middle-Ages, for example the Charter of Tournai given to the city by the French king Philippe-Auguste said : «Si quelqu'un occit un homme de la commune de Tournay, à l'intérieur ouen dehors de la cité, s'il est pris, qu'il perde le chef...» Indeed the actual concept of the commune, as a subdivision of the territory, is from the french occupation but the name itself is not republican. David Descamps 13:57, 29 December 2006 (UTC)

Neither confound languages, nor their very different connotations of (loan)words. This is the English-language Wikipedia, not the one in the French language; your described connotations are actually of 'municipalité' and exist purely in French, and I would support your changing to the normal French term 'commune' if such would be(come) needed on the French Wikipedia, but such changes absolutely need reverting on the English Wikipedia as this language has the very neutral and precise 'municipality' versus a highly ambiguous and certainly not more neutral 'commune'. We cannot and mustnot fight the language. David please, undo your changes. Understand, as a Belgian citizen, I really hate the English usage of the term 'Dutch' for the language, as if native speakers would be Dutch, which means belonging to the Dutch people - but I cannot start changing it towards 'Netherlandic'. (In Dutch, this language is Nederlands which term originates from de Nederlanden, the historic Netherlands of which my home city once was the capital, whereas the people of current Nederland are Nederlanders.) Countries or regions where the French language is natively spoken and as such use commune, should between parenthesis mention that French term and not municipalité as French in the relevant articles. — SomeHuman 1 Jan 2007 16:23 (UTC)

Sure, I will revert my changes. I don't want to be in confrontation, it is just I thought the term commune was recognized enough in the English language. I found it in the "Oxford American Dictionaries" as the "smallest territorial division for administrative purposes". David Descamps 16:53, 1 January 2007 (UTC)

Thanks David. Before reading your reply, I had just prepared this as well, perhaps it's still also useful for other readers :

The other articles you named on my talk page as examples — Communes of France, Communes of Luxembourg, Comune (in Italy), Medieval commune — can be either correct like possibly in Medieval commune and Communes of France as far as the term 'commune' is stated to actually have a clearly distinctive meaning [for simplicity, I will here neither deny, nor confirm a sufficiently essential distinction from the English definition of municipality; nor judge whether that distinction is properly brought forward in the articles], or else blurred by the same connotations as many of its editors natively speak a romance language just like you do. Certainly the definition of 'municipality' matches the French & Dutch terms 'commune' & 'gemeente' in all three regions of Belgium. For this administrative subdivision, I say commune while speaking French but in English I say municipality and in Thai tambon or sometimes amphoe because the latter, rather a district (not like a sub-municipal entity of Antwerp but much as a Belgian electoral and administrative arrondissement though the lowest Thai judicial level is found in the provicial capital or changwat) as well as its capital, has tasks that we consider municipal (more so until a few years ago), but also a tambon has locally elected officials and council with certain municipal tasks — all regardless whether it is located in Belgium, in France, in Scotland, or in Thailand. Nevertheless, articles mentioning the Thai subdivisions should refer to 'amphoe' and 'tambon' precisely because there is an essential distinction from the English concept of a 'municipality'.

You're quite right about the term 'commune' being recognized in English, and commonly used as well; it's just not encyclopaedically precise & unambiguous. You can certainly speak about communes, this will be the more obvious as only the pronunciation varies from your own language - and in practical usage most often precise enough. But in everyday English, most people do not often use terms like 'administrative subdivisions' of which one level should best be called the 'municipality'.

You might be interested in Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Belgium#"Arrondissement" and "Municipality" as well.

Best regards and best wishes for this new year. — SomeHuman 1 Jan 2007 17:48-23:20 (UTC)