(Re-)Assessing Career Patterns in Multi-Level Systems: Insights from Wallonia in Belgium

Abstract

This article proposes a new analytical framework for the study of political careers in multi-level systems. It is argued that the study of vertical movements between political arenas, which constitutes the prevalent methodological approach in the literature on political careers, should be complemented by the study of horizontal movements within political arenas. Based on a longitudinal analysis of individual political careers, the micro-approach developed in this article allows the comprehension of all territorial dynamics of political careers in multi-level systems. Based on an in-depth case study of all 419 Walloon careers in Belgium, four career patterns are identified: national careers, regional careers, multi-level careers and discrete careers. Although Belgium presents an integrated structure of opportunity, it is demonstrated that key evidences underline the prevalence of a regional and a national political class along a highly integrated political elites.

Key Words:

• multi-level systems
• career patterns
• political class
• Wallonia
• Belgium

Acknowledgements

I am grateful for the helpful comments by the two anonymous reviewers of this journal.

The present article received the prize of the David-Constant Medal (2010). The prize is awarded to a scientific contribution written the year following the graduation of the winner of the David-Constant Medal. The medal rewards the best student graduated in Law, Political Science or Criminology, for his/her undergraduate and postgraduate performance at the Faculty of Law and Political Science or the Jean-Constant school of Criminology, University of Liège, Belgium.

Notes

1 For the sake of clarity, the regional level denotes any subnational level of government, irrespective of the actual institutional names used in countries: Provinces in Canada, Regions and Communities in Belgium, Comunidades autónomas in Spain, Länder in Germany, State Legislature in the US etc.

2 Until very recently, the term of political class was often substituted with the concept of political elites in political science (for the analytical distinction between these two concepts see Von Beyme, 1996).

3 Alternatively, the four boxes in Stolz's matrix can be grouped into three categories, as the classic springboard and the inverse springboard both form the unidirectional model (Borchert, 2011, 132). Similarly, Rodríguez-Teruel (2011) proposes a classification with “horizontal”, “top-down”, “vertical” and “transversal” careers.

4 All data from the website of the National Conference of the State Legislatures, accessed in November 2012: http://www.ncsl.org/legislatures-elections/state-federal/former-state-legislators-in-congress.aspx

5 “An ideal type is formed by the one-sided accentuation of one or more points of view and by the synthesis of a great many diffuse, discrete, more or less present and occasionally absent concrete individual phenomena, which are arranged according to those one-sidedly emphasized viewpoints into a unified analytical construct” (Weber, 1949 [1904]).

6 The predominance of one or several career patterns must be appreciated in the light of the overall percentage of positions available at the distinct levels of government.

7 Contrary to other studies based on datasets mixing French-speaking MPs from Brussels and Wallonia, this research is strictly restricted to Walloon political careers, which explain slight variations in the findings.

8 This is due to the particular high accessibility of the Walloon seats at the first regional elections. There were 112 Walloon national seats in 1992—69 deputies and 43 senators, including the provincial (five) and the co-opted (four) members—and 75 regional seats were newly created in 1995 (a ratio of around 3:2). At that moment, the number of Walloon national seats was reduced by around 50%, creating an incentive for the large Walloon part of the national political class, representing almost twice the size of the Walloon Parliament, to move to the regional level.

9 Furthermore, Vanlangenakker et al. (2013) calculated that between 38.7 and 49.3% of all the Walloon MPs were candidates at national elections since 2003, even though only a few of them got elected and even fewer decided to switch offices.

10 If we also include representatives with a former experience, but who did not resign their seat to move to another level, there are 55 politicians who moved only once in total.

11 Since 1995, members of the government cannot be members of any parliaments. If so, they are replaced during their governmental functions but they retrieve their parliamentary seat when they are no longer a member of the government.

12 And even though Belgium has a semi-open list system that permits a certain degree of personalization, most of the candidates have to be in favour with the party leadership to be well positioned on the list.