FIDIC Contracts in Europe
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Chapter 5
Applying FIDIC Contracts in Belgium
5.1
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Outline of the Belgian legal environment
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5.1.1 The constitutional structure of Belgium
Belgium is a constitutional and parliamentary monarchy. It has been a single state for almost 150 years after having become independent in 1830. However, as a founding member of the now European Union, Belgium has witnessed a significant transfer of power in the past decades. Through various sets of constitutional reforms (in 1970, 1980, 1988, 1993, 2001 and 2014), Belgium also went through drastic change from a unitary state into a federal state. Decision-making power in Belgium is no longer exclusively held by national authorities but shared among several national and regional authorities, which exercise their competences independently in a number of areas.