Brussels, a truncated metropolis

Abstract

This paper describes and analyses the geographical development and the governmental, budget and administrative structure of Brussels. It defines the place Brussels occupies among the cities of Europe and assesses the value of its Regional Development Plan. Brussels appears to be highly successful in international inter-city competition, but it also appears to be unable to develop a strategy for dealing with the problems of the divided city it has become in the late-20th century. Key factors in explaining this paradox are a discrepancy between the political delimitation of the Brussels Capital Region (a member state of the federal state of Belgium) and the geographical urban region, and the administrative fragmentation of the Brussels Capital Region. These factors are strongly related to the reform of the Belgian state and the forces behind this reform. In the absence of a strategy based on solidarity within the metropolitan community, one has to fear for the development towards a repressive city.