A draw for Flemish nationalism: Institutional change and stability in the Belgian sport system

This article combines insights from historical institutionalism with the literature on ideational policy change to explain why Belgian sport institutions like the national football team appear as outliers in the story of the country's unidirectional move towards a decentralised federal state. It shows how Flemish nationalist ideas drove the asymmetrical decentralisation of the originally unitary Belgian sport system. On one hand, mechanisms of gradual institutional change led to the complete decentralisation of public sport policy. The Flemish government consequently has the authority and mean... Mehr ...