Acknowledgement as a precondition for accommodation : elite intergroup recognition in Belgium’s federal parliament (1961–2023) and the impact of decentralisation and regionalist party strength

This paper revisits the role of elite accommodation in consociational democracies by shifting analytical attention to intergroup acknowledgement. We argue that a minimal level of recognition between societal groups is a necessary precondition for accommodation: Without genuine acknowledgement across societal group boundaries, accommodation cannot take place. We conceptualise referring to other MPs/MGs in parliamentary speeches as a measurable indicator of such acknowledgement. Focusing on Belgium, which has long been regarded as a prime example of elite accommodation but where it now appears to be under threat, this paper quantitatively examines this crucial condition. Using a new dataset of 22,236 speeches from Belgium’s federal parliament, covering investiture and State of the Union debates between 1961 and 2023, this paper shows that Belgian elites primarily refer to MPs/MGs of their own respective language groups. Furthermore, we show that the decentralisation of competences leads to less intergroup recognition and that, contrary to expectations, an increase in regionalist party strength in parliament leads to more intergroup recognition.