Federation of the liberal students

}} " style=" vertical-align: signal; text-align: left; " | European Affiliation | LYMEC |- class=" " style=" vertical-align: signal; text-align: left; " | international Affiliation | IFLRY |- | colspan=" 2" | |- style=" vertical-align: signal; text-align: left; " | Ideology | Liberalism |- style=" vertical-align: signal; text-align: left; " | Color | Blue |- | colspan=" 2" | |- style=" vertical-align: signal; text-align: left; " | Official site | www.etudiantsliberaux.be |}

The Fédération of the Liberal Students (FEL) is an independent Belgian political youth organization, gathering the whole of the circles and liberal student movements present on the student campuses of French Communauté of Belgium. The Federation of the Liberal Students defends and propagates, according to its statutes, the basic principles of freedom, responsibility and solidarity on the policy plans, economic, social and cultural.

History

Birth of the Liberal Students (1836)

The Liberal Students appeared a few years only after the creation of Belgium: founded during the academic year 1835-1836, the group in addition constitutes the first studied circle of the Universit3e libre de Bruxelles, like one of the first liberal political trainings of the country, the Liberal party going to be founded later only 10 years. Taking as a starting point the liberals of the time like Pierre-Theodore Verhaegen, they contribute to the emergence of a liberalism progressist and anticlerical, closely related to the context of the foundation of the University of the Free-examination. The Circle of the Liberal Students of the ULB will remain during a long time the only political circle of the ULB.

It is then in Liege, a few years later, that the Liberal Students develop. The students inhabitant of Li2ege federate in 1895, the Federation of the Plain Liberal Students was born… The Liberal Students of Brussels and Liege will constitute, until today, the principal French-speaking bastions of the liberal action coed.

The Liberal Students find themselves around common values, those of a liberalism of progress. Thus, they will be burning defenders of the vote for all, obtained in 1919.

The emergence of the Flemish Liberal Students (1930)

The beginning of 20th century will see being born the Flemish Liberal Students ( Liberaal Vlaams Studentenverbond ), in Ghent in 1930 then in Brussels in 1937. Like their hanging French-speaking people, they will constitute the most important political associations on the campuses.

The French-speaking and Dutch-speaking Liberal Students will know during 40-45 one difficult period the German occcupation. Some of between-them will join resistance, as within the Group G with the ULB. The liberal studenten will publish a clandestine newspaper ( Den kleinen Belg ). These acts antifascists will end in the deportation of certain liberal students, like former president Frans De Hondt.

The Belgian Federation of the Liberal Students

With the birth of new sections, in Namur, Leuwen, Antwerp, Mons and Courtrai, the Liberal Students of all the country gather. The Belgian Fédération of the Liberal Students (FBEL) was born! She will play in particular a big role within the Liberal party, also still national. The Liberal Students will be thus characterized, with respect to the PLP, by their ideological impulses, their naive spirit, their critical attitude and their culture of the debate.

This union will last only a time. Beginning of the year' 70, the FBEL is divided whereas the Dutch-speaking wing, around some Guy Verhofstadt, intends to give a more regional tone to the political discourse of the Liberal Students. This time will also ring the knell of a unit liberal party.

The Federation of the Liberal Students (1974)

It is in this linguistic context that the Liberal Students of the French-speaking campuses will find within the Fédération of the Liberal Students (FEL), rested by the ulbist Willem Draps, in 1974.

Whereas May' 68 regrets the silence of the liberal students; attitude which will be worth the rich person wire label to them “” and a certain demobilization in the liberal rows, the first years of the FEL will be placed under the action and the combat against the Marxist ideas. The war of Vietnam will have had as a consequence an opposition often extremely virulent between the communist students and the liberal students. The fight will be so important that the liberal students will be regarded soon as “revolutionists” refusing the yoke of the communist dictatorships.

The liberal students will also engage in great very philosophical security questions. Thus, they will militate in particular for the right to the abortion or that of the euthanasia. Probably under the influence of the committees of the Circle of the liberal students of the ULB, the FEL, until today, a critical attitude vis-a-vis the opening of the doors of the Liberal party in the catholic mediums will preserve, ideological reorientation started already in 1959.

The Liberal Students will have, with the wire of the last decades, lost in force with respect to the liberal party, on the contrary probably of their Flemish colleagues. The direction of the PRL by strong men, the fall of the mobilization of the liberal students end of the year' 90 and the widening of the party will have placed the FEL in periphery of their political training of reference.

The Liberal Students will not have remained one essential liberal movement less about it, mainly within the student's mediums. They will have been also characterized by their independence with respect to the party, sometimes exerted in a strange way as during agreement PRL-FDF-MCC, in 1998, whereas the liberal students opposed an alliance with the former president of the PSC.

Between 1999 and the end of 2001, the FEL will be left for dead whereas its sections are however particularly active on the various campuses but in an autonomous way. Vis-a-vis this report, in 2002, the sections of the ULB and UCL decide the revival of the Federation. A new committee will be set up, chaired by Samuel Wauthier, then president of the liberal students of the UCL. The FEL will be quickly operative.

Since 2002, the FEL will know a new take-off. The successive committees will start again a national publication ( FEL-direct ), will develop new sections (Mons, Charleroi and High-Schools of Brussels), will organize debates suitable for the FEL, will react by line of communication of press on the topicality,…

From 2003 to 2006, the Federation will be chaired by Gautier Calomne, former president of the liberal students of the ULB. The FEL will become again then the essential place of reflection, particularly progressist, of the liberal students. Whereas she celebrates her thirty year, the FEL will adopt the slogan “freedom keeps ideas”, signs without question of its will to take again a dominating place in the societal debates, that of the Liberal Students.

Some reflections carried out by the FEL, since 2003, will distinguish it. It successively positions in favor of the marriage by the of the same couples sex, of a greater vigilance with respect to the Church of scientology, in favor of the maintenance of Latin at the school, in favor of a refinancing of teach higher, in favor of the opening of the gay adoption to the couples, in favor of training course to religious neutrality, of the opening of the right to vote the abroads non-europens.

Since November 2006, the Federation of the Liberal Students is chaired by Arnaud Van Praet.

History of the Presidents

  • Willem Cloths (1974-1976)
  • Daniel Bacquelaine (1976-1978)
  • Alain Lescrenier (1978-1981)
  • Pierre Gilisen (1981-1983)
  • Pierre Parlongue (1983-1984)
  • Emmanuel Denis (1984-1985)
  • Jacques Simonet (1985-1986)
  • Willy Borsus (1986-1987)
  • Jean-Paul Blue (1987-1988)
  • Marc Bruyr (1988-1990)
  • Pierre-Louis Galand (1990-1991)
  • Philippe Knaepen (1991-1993)
  • Herve-Jacques Poskin (1993-1994)
  • Patrick Smets (1994-1996)
  • Alex Baudrenghien (1996-1997)
  • Olivier Remacle (1997-1999)
  • Géraud De Biolley (1999-2001)
  • Samuel Wauthier (2002-2003)
  • Gautier Calomne (2003-2006)
  • Arnaud Van Praet (2006-)

Personalities passed through the Liberal Students

Bonds

External bonds

  • Site of the Federation of the Liberal Students

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