The present article draws a map of the results that the major Belgian political parties, as well as strictly local candidates have obtained in the local elections of october 10, 1976.These first elections within the newly merged municipal circonscriptions have substantially altered the nature of the lists of candidates. Henceforth, the local-scale politica! image shows a strong similarity with the image, seen in general elections. The two most important political formations, the CVP in the Flemish part of the country, and (...) the PSB in the Walloon part, each maintain the dominant position in their respective territory. In the electoral district BrusselsCapital, the PDF has strengthened its position in comparison with the former local elections of 1970.The evolution in the local electoral process shows that the partypolitical influence has become decisive in most communes, whereas before, and mainly in the many small size communes, the purely local character was preponderant. In these latest local elections, the average number of lists of candidates has increased ; therefore, one may say that the mergers of communes have had a positive effect on the actual possibilities forelectoral competition. (shrink)

Political power in Brussels is not distributed randomly over its area. There is hardly any political power situated in districts with a very low socio-economic status, white there is an overconcentration of political power in districts with a high SES in relation to their population. The residents of very low SES districts are deprived in two ways : almost no power is situated in their districts and the office bolders who do live in them are generally among the least powerful.It (...) is noted that the power of the Dutch-language parties is distributed over the Brussels agglomeration in another way than the French-language parties. The power of the Dutch-language parties is situated primarily in low SES districts, while French-language parties have their power mainly in districts with a high SES.The lack of political power of very low SES districts is not new. Since World War II, there has never been much power located in the zones where the part of the population that occupies the base of the production process lives. Democracy is still not able to prevent the formation of areas within the Brussels agglomeration in which the residents have a very small share in the power of the political parties. (shrink)

The distribution of the seats in European Parliament which is most probably to result from the European elections in Belgium, on June 10, 1979 is forecasted.The extrapolation is based on the results of the general elections for the House of Representatives, which took place on April 17, 1977 and December 17, 1978.The mode of allocation of seats among the different political formations is influenced not only by the options taken by the parties themselves, whether they form a coalition with a (...) like-minded party or not,but also by some characteristics of the electoral systems.Alternative systems lead to a different distribution than the one that is most likely to come out. (shrink)

Based upon the electoral results from the 17/4/1977 general election this study examines how the introduction of a system of single majoritarian representation might «reshuffle the cards» among the various politica! parties.Furthermore, one has examined which might be the consequences of the introduction of majoritarian representation for the over-all functioning of the Belgian political system. One bas also explored the possibilities to counterbalance the possible negative consequences of such a representation system.