Belgian General Strikes
   HOME
*



picture info

Belgian General Strikes
Since 1893, there have been a number of general strikes in Belgium. Occasioned by the emergence of the labour movement and socialism in Belgium, general strikes have been an enduring part of Belgian political life. Originally intended to encourage the reform of the franchise, more recent strikes have focused on issues of wages and opposition to government austerity. Since 1945, general strikes have been co-ordinated by the General Federation of Belgian Labour (ABVV-FGTB), a federation of Socialist trade unions, while most before World War II were organised by the parliamentary Belgian Labour Party (POB-BWP). According to Carl J. Strikwerda, the Belgian general strike of 1893 was the first general strike in the European history. Origins In 1866, the Belgian government revoked the articles of the Le Chapelier Law which had outlawed trade unions. The first strikes followed soon after. A mining strike occurred in 1868 and textile workers went on strike during the economic depression ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Bruxelles Laermans Greve
Brussels (french: Bruxelles or ; nl, Brussel ), officially the Brussels-Capital Region (All text and all but one graphic show the English name as Brussels-Capital Region.) (french: link=no, Région de Bruxelles-Capitale; nl, link=no, Brussels Hoofdstedelijk Gewest), is a region of Belgium comprising 19 municipalities, including the City of Brussels, which is the capital of Belgium. The Brussels-Capital Region is located in the central portion of the country and is a part of both the French Community of Belgium and the Flemish Community, but is separate from the Flemish Region (within which it forms an enclave) and the Walloon Region. Brussels is the most densely populated region in Belgium, and although it has the highest GDP per capita, it has the lowest available income per household. The Brussels Region covers , a relatively small area compared to the two other regions, and has a population of over 1.2 million. The five times larger metropolitan area of Brussels co ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Universal Male Suffrage
Universal manhood suffrage is a form of voting rights in which all adult male citizens within a political system are allowed to vote, regardless of income, property, religion, race, or any other qualification. It is sometimes summarized by the slogan, "one man, one vote". History In 1789, Revolutionary France adopted the Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen and, although short-lived, the National Convention was elected by all men in 1792. It was revoked by the Directory in 1795. Universal male suffrage was re-established in France in the wake of the French Revolution of 1848. In the Australian colonies, universal male suffrage first became law in the colony of South Australia in 1856. This was followed by the colonies of Victoria and New South Wales in 1857 and 1858. This included the introduction of the secret ballot. In the United States, the rise of Jacksonian democracy from the 1820s to 1850s led to a close approximation of universal manhood suffrage among w ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Popular Front (France)
The Popular Front (french: Front populaire) was an alliance of French left-wing movements, including the communist French Communist Party (PCF), the socialist French Section of the Workers' International (SFIO) and the progressive Radical-Socialist Republican Party, during the interwar period. Three months after the victory of the Spanish Popular Front, the Popular Front won the May 1936 legislative election, leading to the formation of a government first headed by SFIO leader Léon Blum and exclusively composed of republican and SFIO ministers. Blum's government implemented various social reforms. The workers' movement welcomed this electoral victory by launching a general strike in May–June 1936, resulting in the negotiation of the Matignon Agreements, one of the cornerstones of social rights in France. All employees were assured a two-week paid vacation, and the rights of unions were strengthened. The socialist movement's euphoria was apparent in SFIO member Marceau Pi ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Port Of Antwerp
The Port of Antwerp-Bruges is the port of the City of Antwerp. It is located in Flanders (Belgium), mainly in the province of Antwerp but also partially in the province of East Flanders. It is a seaport in the heart of Europe accessible to capesize ships. It is Europe’s second-largest seaport, after Rotterdam. Antwerp stands at the upper end of the tidal estuary of the Scheldt. The estuary is navigable by ships of more than 100,000 Gross Tons as far as 80 km inland. Like the Port of Hamburg, the Port of Antwerp's inland location provides a more central location in Europe than the majority of North Sea ports. Antwerp's docks are connected to the hinterland by rail, road, and river and canal waterways. As a result, the port of Antwerp has become one of Europe's largest seaports, ranking second behind Rotterdam by total freight shipped. Its international rankings vary from 11th to 20th ( AAPA). In 2012, the Port of Antwerp handled 14,220 sea trade ships (190.8 million ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  




Belgian General Strike Of 1936
In Belgium, a general strike took place in June and July 1936. It was the first wave of strikes since the 1932 general strike which had occurred during the Great Depression. It broke out as part of a wildcat strike among dockworkers in the Port of Antwerp on 2 June 1936 and quickly spread to other industrial regions without the endorsement of the country's major trades unions. It was characterised by the new tactic of workplace occupations and took place against the backdrop of the creation of France's Popular Front in May 1936 and the Matignon Agreements which had followed a general strike in France from May to June 1936. It also occurred against the backdrop of the Spanish Civil War which proved divisive in Belgium. Nonetheless, the Belgian strike was unusual in uniting socialist and Catholic trade union federations in support. Paul Van Zeeland, the incumbent Catholic prime minister, agreed to convene a National Labour Conference (''Conférence Nationale du Travail'') on 17 Jun ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Great Depression
The Great Depression (19291939) was an economic shock that impacted most countries across the world. It was a period of economic depression that became evident after a major fall in stock prices in the United States. The economic contagion began around September and led to the Wall Street stock market crash of October 24 (Black Thursday). It was the longest, deepest, and most widespread depression of the 20th century. Between 1929 and 1932, worldwide gross domestic product (GDP) fell by an estimated 15%. By comparison, worldwide GDP fell by less than 1% from 2008 to 2009 during the Great Recession. Some economies started to recover by the mid-1930s. However, in many countries, the negative effects of the Great Depression lasted until the beginning of World War II. Devastating effects were seen in both rich and poor countries with falling personal income, prices, tax revenues, and profits. International trade fell by more than 50%, unemployment in the U.S. rose to 23% and ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


Communist Party Of Belgium
french: Parti Communiste de Belgique , abbreviation = KPB-PCB , colorcode = , leader1_title = Historical leaders , leader1_name = Joseph JacquemotteJulien LahautLouis Van Geyt , founder = Julien Lahaut , founded = , dissolved = , merger = Communist PartyBelgian Communist Party , successor = Kommunistische Partij Parti Communiste , headquarters = Brussels , newspaper = ''De Roode Vaan'' (Flemish)''Le Drapeau Rouge'' (French) , youth_wing = Communist Youth of Belgium , wing1_title = Paramilitary wing , wing1 = Partisans Armés (1940-43) , membership_year = 1965 , membership = 11,000 (peak) , ideology = CommunismEurocommunism , position = Far-left , international = Comintern (1919–1943)Cominform (1947–1956) , european = , europarl = Communist and Allies Group (1973–1989) , colours = Red , country = Belgium The Communist Party of Belgium ( nl, Kommunistische Partij van België, or KPB; french: Parti Communiste de Belgique, PCB) was a political party ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Borinage
The Borinage () is an area in the Walloon province of Hainaut in Belgium. The name derives from the coal mines of the region, ''bores'' meaning mineshafts. In French the inhabitants of the Borinage are called Borains. The provincial capital Mons is located in the east of the Borinage, but there was a great sociological difference between the inhabitants of Mons and the Borains of all the villages around Mons. Rise and fall of coal "From the 18th century to 1850, the economy of thirty municipalities in the Borinage was founded on coal mining. Between 1822 and 1829, production more than doubled in that region i.e. from 602,000 to 1,260,000 tons. That was more than the total production of France and Germany at the time. The Borinage exported its coal mostly to France and Flanders." In 1878, several fossils of iguanodons were found: this find was unique because complete skeletons were present. When this area was occupied by the Germans in World War I, a few attempts were made ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Coal Miner
Coal mining is the process of resource extraction, extracting coal from the ground. Coal is valued for its Energy value of coal, energy content and since the 1880s has been widely used to generate electricity. Steel and cement industries use coal as a fuel for extraction of iron from iron ore and for cement production. In the United Kingdom and South Africa, a coal mine and its structures are a colliery, a coal mine is called a 'pit', and the above-ground structures are a 'pit head'. In Australia, "colliery" generally refers to an underground coal mine. Coal mining has had many developments in recent years, from the early days of men tunneling, digging and manually extracting the coal on carts to large Open-pit mining, open-cut and Longwall mining, longwall mines. Mining at this scale requires the use of Dragline excavator, draglines, trucks, conveyors, hydraulic jacks and shearers. The coal mining industry has a long history of significant negative Health and environmental im ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


Belgian General Strike Of 1932
The general strike of 1932 was a major strike which broke out in Belgium on 7 July 1932. It began after a spontaneous strike by coal miners in the Borinage and involved communist agitation amid a severe decrease in living standards and real wages, as well as high unemployment, caused by the Great Depression. Two people were killed during the strike which only ended on 9 September 1932. The strike served as the inspiration for the 1934 documentary film ''Misère au Borinage'' directed by Henri Storck and Joris Ivens Georg Henri Anton "Joris" Ivens (18 November 1898 – 28 June 1989) was a Dutch documentary filmmaker. Among the notable films he directed or co-directed are '' A Tale of the Wind'', '' The Spanish Earth'', ''Rain'', ''...A Valparaiso'', ''M .... Further reading * * * External linksLa Grève générale de 1932. 'Qu’est ce que cette grève du Borinage sinon le peuple ouvrier qui se met en colère ?'by Colette Hubert (Centre d'animation et de recherche en histoi ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

German Occupation Of Belgium During World War I
The German occupation of Belgium (french: link=no, Occupation allemande, nl, Duitse bezetting) of World War I was a military occupation of Belgium by the forces of the German Empire between 1914 and 1918. Beginning in August 1914 with the invasion of neutral Belgium, the country was almost completely overrun by German troops before the winter of the same year as the Allied forces withdrew westwards. The Belgian government went into exile, while King Albert I and the Belgian Army continued to fight on a section of the Western Front. Under the German military, Belgium was divided into three separate administrative zones. The majority of the country fell within the General Government, a formal occupation administration ruled by a German general, while the others, closer to the front line, came under more repressive direct military rule. The German occupation coincided with a widespread economic collapse in Belgium with shortages and widespread unemployment, but also with a ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

World War I
World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fighting occurring throughout Europe, the Middle East, Africa, the Pacific, and parts of Asia. An estimated 9 million soldiers were killed in combat, plus another 23 million wounded, while 5 million civilians died as a result of military action, hunger, and disease. Millions more died in genocides within the Ottoman Empire and in the 1918 influenza pandemic, which was exacerbated by the movement of combatants during the war. Prior to 1914, the European great powers were divided between the Triple Entente (comprising France, Russia, and Britain) and the Triple Alliance (containing Germany, Austria-Hungary, and Italy). Tensions in the Balkans came to a head on 28 June 1914, following the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdin ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]