Brutal austerity and unprecedented strike wave shatters Belgian social model

The bosses’ organisation, Federation of Enterprises in Belgium (FEB), dubbed it the “€1 billion strike”. They were referring to the supposed financial loss caused by the three-day strike on 24, 25, and 26 November. This bosses’ propaganda, aimed at frightening workers, instead resulted in many people thinking: “Wow, is this the wealth that our work produces in just three days? And what would happen if the CEOs and shareholders stopped working? In reality, nobody would notice. We are the real wealth creators!”

These three consecutive days of strikes marked a new peak in a wave of class struggle that began a year ago. Since November 2024, trade union action against the brutal austerity measures of the federal and regional governments has continued unabated.

In fact, it began even before the federal De Wever-Boucher government was finally formed at the end of January 2025. This government is the result of the elections in 2024, where the socialist parties were routed and the right-wing Flemish nationalists and the French-speaking liberals won the votes.

Together with those parties, the small Flemish socialist party (Vooruit) and the two Christian democratic parties formed a new government. This coalition is called the ‘Arizona’ government, as the propaganda colours of those parties resemble the colours of the US state of Arizona. It is undisputedly the most right-wing government since the Second World War. “A historical opportunity”, according to the spokesperson of the bosses organisation.

Since then, there have been no fewer than 13 national actions initiated by the unions, including two national demonstrations, which were veritable tidal waves, with 100,000 and 140,000 demonstrators respectively. Demonstrations with more than 100,000 participants are a rare event in Belgium. To find larger demonstrations, we must go back to the ‘White March’ of 1996, when 300,000 people marched through the centre of the capital during a severe crisis of the regime, which had pre-revolutionary characteristics.

The recent strike wave has been marked by two inter-professional strikes (i.e. involving public and private sector workers), as well as by two days of public service strikes. Railway workers, the real spearhead of the movement, now have nearly 30 days of strikes under their belts and are still ready to fight back: they have announced a new strike lasting five days at the end of January.

Kurt Vandaele, the undisputed expert on strike statistics, has recorded 185 strike days per 1,000 workers in the first half of 2025. “The De Wever government thus seems set to break the strike record set by the Dehaene I government (from 1992 to 1995).”

This is no accident, given that the depth and scope of the Arizona government’s austerity policies are without precedent. Belgium has one of the highest debt rates in Europe (106.6 percent of GDP in 2025, and projected to rise to 111.3 percent in 2029) and a deficit in government spending of five percent of GDP. Meanwhile, the economy is almost stagnating, with GDP having grown by 1.2 percent last year, and projected to grow by 1.1 percent in 2026.

The manufacturing and the building sectors are going through a recession. So the bosses and their government are adamant about attacking the workers and their rights. All sectors of the working class and the poorer layers of the middle classes are affected. The budget cuts and counter-reforms in unemployment benefits, pensions, health and education, as well as attacks on labour law and wages, are a major onslaught against what most workers would identify with the Belgian social model.

The government is also attacking democratic rights, threatening to introduce a law that would prohibit certain people from demonstrating and drastically reducing the funding of NGOs which defend ‘totalitarian’ views. It also wants to give itself the power to ban organisations involved in solidarity with Palestine (such as the Palestinian prisoner solidarity network, Samidoun) or in antifascist activities (‘Antifa’).

Three examples illustrate the brutality of the government’s anti-worker onslaught: a ‘malus’ principle will be introduced in the pension system, penalising anybody who retires before a certain age, forcing nurses, building workers and teachers, among others, to work at least until 67 years of age. If they want to leave work earlier, they will lose hundreds of euros each month – 25 percent of their pension.

Pensions in Belgium are already quite poor. The low replacement rate of the average pension means that Belgian pensions are already more than €400 lower than in neighbouring countries.

The second example is the sliding scale of wages. A large part of the working class which benefits from this system will see it suspended, losing between €10,000 to €20,000 over the course of their careers. Thirdly, unemployment benefits will stop after two years, which will push around 200,000 people into poverty in 2026.

In the meantime the Belgian government is drastically increasing military expenditure to a staggering €34 billion, a level not even seen in the Cold War, and is introducing ‘voluntary’ military service for young people. It is hysterically beating the drums of war.

The Minister of Defence has even threatened to wipe out Moscow with nuclear missiles (which he does not possess!) if a Russian rocket were to hit Brussels. Meanwhile, he seems incapable to even intercept one or two supposedly Russian drones which flew over a Belgian military base late last year.

The ‘€1 billion strike’

The so-called ‘€1 billion strike’ (to borrow the bosses’ moniker) in November 2025 was immediately preceded by a demonstration against sexist and sexual violence on Sunday 22 November. This is very significant, given that women are most severely impacted by the government's social violence.

On the first day of the strike, public transport (trains, buses and trams) throughout the country was seriously disrupted or simply stopped. Railway workers reported participation rates of 60 to 70 percent in the strike. For the first time in a long period, public transport union activists in Brussels set up picket lines in front of the various depots.

These initiatives illustrate the willingness of some workers to take the struggle into their own hands / Image: fair use

On the second day, all public services joined the public transport workers who were continuing their strike. And on the third day, all economic sectors in the country (private and public) were seriously disrupted or even paralysed. In the industrial sector, picket lines played only a formal role as most if not all workers participated in the strikes.

The government attempted to make the strike invisible in the media by announcing a surprise agreement on the budget at 6am on the first day. Predictably, the media played along with De Wever and Boucher. In the end, the violence of the new attacks strengthened the workers’ mobilisation. The three days of strikes are probably the biggest in 30 years.

The first thing that this mighty wave of class struggle has shown is the strength of the working class once it takes action. Nothing moves without the work of our class. This illustrates once again how the working class is the most important and powerful class in society. Employers are nothing more than parasites with no real social utility.

Secondly, these strikes highlight the great anger that is stirring among broad sections of society. Not only workers, but increasingly small traders are also increasingly coming into opposition to the government.

Another strong point is the unity between the trade union confederations, as well as between the public and private sectors, and between Flanders, Brussels, and Wallonia. This is remarkable in a country where linguistic and community divisions are fuelled by the various bourgeois parties as well as by the so-called socialist parties.

In many places, trade unions have not been content with striking in their workplaces, but have also organised both partial and complete blockades of industrial zones and major logistics hubs. For example, Belgium’s two busiest airports – Brussels and Charleroi – were almost entirely shut down, with both having to cancel all departures. Ports were also blockaded, nearly all departures and arrivals from Antwerp and Ghent, two of Belgium’s most important ports, were suspended. The workers of Belgium have clearly learnt from the methods of the ‘block everything’ movement that erupted across Europe last year.

Flying pickets have sprung up in several cities to support other workplaces or sectors in struggle, such as the retail sector.

It is also noticeable that where strikes are well prepared, with one or more meetings of all the staff in the workplace, participation is greater. These meetings serve first and foremost to convince workers of the validity of the planned action by keeping them informed while exposing the government’s lies. There is no question about it: this is the best way to proceed. Where this preparatory work is not done or is rushed, workers are less supportive or do not support the action at all.

In Brussels, university and high school students, and their newly established collectives, were crucial in supporting some of the mobilisations, giving the strike an extra touch of combativeness. Remarkably, a rap group, Achille et Tmoin, participated in numerous picket lines. Their songs, Arizona Shoot and Grève Générale (General Strike), became popular anthems for the strikers. These are the sort of little anecdotal indications that point to a fact of the highest significance: these strikes are drawing in really youthful layers.

At Saint-Pierre Hospital, midwives were at the forefront of the struggle with a 36-hour strike against “the commodification of health”. In Brussels we also saw workers beginning to organise outside the trade unions or the collectives at the grassroots of the trade unions (Ecole en Lutte, Santé en Lutte, Université en Lutte, Commune Colère, etc.), but at this stage this remains very much a minority in the movement.

These initiatives illustrate the willingness of some workers – especially young people, who are not involved in trade union structures – to take the struggle into their own hands, using more democratic and radical methods of struggle.

Special mention should be made of the three days of blockades and occupations by students and some of the teaching and research staff at the Université Libre de Bruxelles. Making the very wise choice to go on strike, they succeeded in turning the ULB into a hotbed of political and historical debate and agitation unparalleled in the recent history of struggles in Belgium.

An unprecedented wave of struggle

The current wave of struggle is quite unprecedented in the country’s history. It illustrates the growing anger among all sections of the working class and even among the lower middle classes. Added to this are the 12 national demonstrations of solidarity with Palestine that have been held, the largest of which took place in September with 120,000 participants, and the strike of students and academics at the end of October demanding an end to university collaboration with Israel.

In just a few months, this government has managed to alienate part of its electorate, who have realised the shameless lies of the parties they voted for. In the event of new parliamentary elections, the latest opinion polls point to the Arizona parties losing their majority. We can see proof of the extent of social anger also in the participation even of part of the judiciary, police, and military in certain trade union actions.

We have to go back to the 1960s to find a sequence of strikes as intense as the three days of 24, 25, and 26 November. The ‘November call’ was the result of strong pressure from the trade union rank and file, which was expressed during the mega-demonstration on 14 October. On that day, 140,000 people from all over the country took to the streets of the capital. More than just a demonstration, it was a veritable social groundswell that poured into the streets of Brussels.

To prevent police violence from being unleashed on demonstrators again, workers must organise their self-defence / Image: fair use

Local trade union teams had clearly succeeded in bringing along colleagues who were not used to participating in demonstrations. Many were demonstrating for the first time. Another remarkable feature of this demonstration – as in the anti-government protests that took place in February – was the joyful and combative presence of many young people, students, and high school pupils alongside the trade unionists. The trade unions’ logistical preparations were not up to the task of dealing with such a large crowd.

There were numerous reports of demonstrators being unable to access the special trains or union buses to bring them in time to the demonstration. This is an example of how the grassroots are outpacing the conservative union leadership and apparatus, who clearly didn’t expect such a large turnout. Earlier this year, Flemish teachers and firefighters gave their union leaders the same surprise when more than 30,000 of them turned up for a ‘static’ protest in a square that was far too small to hold them all.

The fierce repression by the police of part of the 14 October demonstration also left an indelible mark on the consciousness of many participants. Even a police trade union denounced the ‘police violence’ targeted at the protesters. The police were not acting on their own initiative. Rather, they were responding to the political agenda of the government: any action that did not conform to the authorised framework of protest had to be repressed.

This is a warning from the state apparatus not to imitate the ‘block everything’ approach of the French and Italian workers. To prevent this police violence from being unleashed on demonstrators again, workers must organise their self-defence, with well-organised and determined stewards.

Politically, the strike wave is also boosting the French-speaking Socialist Party in the polls. More interesting is the progress of the PTB/PVDA (Workers’ Party of Belgium), which is steadily gaining support in the polls. In Brussels it has become the most popular party, with more than 20 percent support. This is no accident. The party and its members are very active and are visibly involved in supporting the trade union movement. On the day of the general strike of 26 November they visited 700 different picket lines.

A lot of activists support the party. However, the party’s line is one of uncritical support for the union leaders, precisely at a moment when internal debate about the strategy of struggle is raging in some unions. In this debate, the PTB/PVDA remains conspicuously silent. Many younger and more radical workers have therefore now found themselves to the left of the party, which they correctly see as too moderate.

Government contempt

The three-day strike was thus the result of pressure from the grassroots of the trade unions on the one hand, and the government's contempt for the ‘customs’ of ‘social dialogue’ on the other.

“After the historic mobilisation on 14 October, we wrote to the Prime Minister and his Deputy Prime Ministers asking for a meeting to convey the concerns and discontent of the population”, confirms Olivier Valentin, General Secretary of the liberal trade union confederation CGSLB (General Confederation of Liberal Trade Unions of Belgium). “None of them deigned to reply”.

This lamentation about the absence of ‘social dialogue’ and the ‘break-up of the social contract’ is not the sole preserve of the liberal trade unions. The same complaints have been heard at the top of the FGTB (General Labour Federation of Belgium) and the CSC (Confederation of Christian Trade Unions), the two largest trade union federations in the country. Whining because the government does not reply to a letter shows how the trade union leaders have fetishised ‘social dialogue’. For them, industrial relations ‘should’ be managed by gentlemen’s agreements between the bosses and the union tops.

The government has declared war on the workers and their organisations / Image: European Union, Wikimedia Commons

But the unions’ criticism contains an important truth: the government has unilaterally inaugurated the end of the ‘rules’ that have governed ‘social-economic relations’ (the relations between the working class, its organisations and the capitalists) since the Second World War. This was already the case with earlier governments but has now taken a more obvious form.

The collapse of the international ‘rules-based order’ between nations goes hand in hand with the collapse of the ‘rules-based order’ between the classes. Now it is ‘gloves off’ between the classes, or, to be more precise, it is ‘gloves off’ as far as the ruling class are concerned. Meanwhile, the leadership and many activists in the unions are still clinging to the old rule book.

To mourn the death of social dialogue is to fail to understand that the government has declared war on the workers and their organisations. It is to fail to understand the nature of the crisis of capitalism and the subsequently imperative need for the system to claw back everything that has been won by the labour movement since the Second World War. In response, the trade union movement must take a firm and uncompromising stand in the arena of class struggle.

Trade union organisations, from national leaderships to shop stewards, must abandon the illusion of social dialogue, which has always been devoid of any progressive content. The goal of the struggle cannot be to find ‘adjustments’ to the announced measures, or to make them more ‘balanced’. Austerity must be ended, and this can only be achieved through the fall of this government and the formation of a workers’ government.

For an honest assessment

Despite the strengths of the strike movement, we must also address its weaknesses. We are not sycophants of the social movement. To move forward, the movement does not need to be praised or flattered. It needs an honest assessment. That is what we will try to do.

The first two weaknesses of the movement are the lack of a militant programme of demands and a genuine plan of action. The trade unions have failed to agree on such a programme. We urgently need a militant programme of demands to improve the situation of the working class immediately. This programme must be popularised among all sections of the population.

In our view, it must include an end to wage freezes, a return to an unmanipulated system of wage indexation, an end to the persecution of the unemployed, and a drastic reduction in working hours to a maximum of 30 hours a week. It must also include the right to retire at 60 (at the latest), a massive increase in the number of civil servants, the hiring of unemployed people on the basis of major public works projects, and the nationalisation (under workers’ control) of all large companies that are laying off workers or are threatened with closure.

It is clear that it is not the ‘Arizona’ government of the rich that will implement such a programme.

As for a programme of action, the union leadership has been groping its way forward for a year, allowing too much time to pass between one mobilisation and the next. As one union activist writes:

“What next? We must return to the front line immediately; waiting until January to remobilise is risky. The workers are demanding action; they want to move forward because they understand what is happening. That in itself is a victory. We are waiting to see what happens next. Not reacting immediately risks disappointing the members as well.”

Active strike

Among other weaknesses, it is worth noting the weight of routine trade union practices aimed at only mobilising the shop stewards for picket lines of companies or at blockades. Too often, the instruction given by shop stewards to workers who want to strike is: stay home. The strike then becomes a very passive exercise for the mass of workers, when it should be an active collective task.

This aspect should not be underestimated. If we want to continue the struggle with strikes that last several days, or even renewable strikes, we must do everything possible to actively involve as many workers as possible. To do this, we must invite and encourage colleagues to come to the picket lines and blockades. For this, it is very useful to form a strike committee, elected at a general meeting, comprising seasoned activists and colleagues without union mandates, who want to get involved.

Flying pickets are also a good way of involving strikers. After the picket rounds, it would be a good idea to organise rallies or demonstrations in the city centre, as the socialist public service union did in Ghent, bringing together 1,000 demonstrators. Strike pickets are also too often ‘boring’ and often lack entertainment. Particular care must be taken to prepare a picket well, with food, drinks, a brazier, music, and political discussions.

And now?

Many people are asking what should happen next. With these three days of strikes, social pressure has increased significantly. There is no doubt about that. The government is pretending not to have seen anything, but that is not true. They see us, they hear us, and they very clearly feel the pressure. But that is not enough. Do we need to add a third or fourth day of general strike for the government to abandon its austerity measures? That's not the right question to ask.

First, to end austerity, the government must fall. Some claim that no government in Belgium has ever been overthrown by a social movement. That’s not true. In 1977, a plan for five days of rotating strikes sealed the fate of the Tindemans government, which resigned in April that year. In 1961, the Eyskens government also resigned after five weeks of general strike. So it is possible now too.

In 1961, the Eyskens government resigned after five weeks of general strike / Image: José Schoovaerts, Wikimedia Commons

When union leaders mention the possible fall of the government they do it timidly, hinting at the need for new elections without the slightest perspectives beyond punishing the Arizona parties. What they would really like is for the French speaking Parti Socialiste to enter a new coalition with the right-wing parties to ‘moderate’ the austerity of the latter. In fact, such a perspective completely fails to understand where austerity comes from: it is not merely the ideological viewpoint of the Arizona government. It is absolutely demanded by the logic of capitalism.

The government must be brought down, and a workers’ government willing to break with capitalism must be brought to power in its place. To achieve the fall of the government, there needs to be a movement of renewable strikes in economically strategic sectors. Are workers ready for this kind of movement? At first glance, it would seem not. The dynamics of the labour movement do not respond to the snap of a finger.

As our comrades in France explained in a very good editorial in September after the emergence of the Bloquons Tout! movement:

“A good programme is essential, but it is not a magic wand with which you can instantly mobilise the masses. This programme must be carried to every corner of the country, company by company, district by district, as part of a vast campaign of agitation.

“Such a campaign is also the best way to accurately gauge the militancy of different layers of the working class. In 1935, Leon Trotsky wrote about the situation in France:

“‘Is a general strike possible in the near future? There is no a priori answer to such a question [...]. To get an answer, one must know how to ask the question. Who? The masses. How to ask them? Through agitation.

“‘Agitation is not only a means of communicating certain slogans to the masses, of calling the masses to action, etc. Agitation is also a means for the party to listen to the masses, to gauge their mood and thoughts and, depending on the results, to take certain practical decisions. [...] For Marxists, for Leninists, agitation is always a dialogue with the masses, [a dialogue that must make it possible to provide] the necessary details, particularly with regard to the rhythm of the movement and the dates for major actions.’

“A major campaign of agitation would make it possible to determine which sections of the working class are ripe for action, and which sectors are still hesitant and need to be convinced. Without a systematic survey of the entire working class, it is not possible to draw up a solid battle plan.

“Of course, this is a long and arduous task. It is easier, but much less conclusive, to throw out calls for a ‘general strike’ to the four winds. As Trotsky pointed out, again with regard to France: “A revolutionary victory is only possible after a long period of political agitation, a long period of education and organisation of the masses.”

To move in this direction a new general strike, lasting 48 or 72 hours, would be a step forward. Alternatively, a plan of rotating regional strikes, culminating in a 48-hour strike, would be a step forward. But these must always be carried out with the perspective of preparing a renewable general strike, around a militant programme, for the fall of the government and for a workers’ government.

Urgent need to solve the strategic impasse

The two main union federations have now announced a new national ‘monster’ demonstration on 12 March. Regional strikes and demonstrations are also being prepared for February. The French teachers, having suffered severe attacks by the regional government, are organising a national demonstration on 25 January. The next day, the united front of the five railway workers’ unions will start a five-day strike.

The year started with a bang when the Brussels firefighters decided to extend their four-hour strike to a full 24 hours. The mood is again heating up. But the federal government seems to have withstood the pressure of the class struggle, despite successive internal crises… so far. A recent report by the Belgian ING bank remarks the following:

“Despite social tensions and political opposition, the administration remains intact, sending a positive signal—especially compared to France, which recently rejected its 2026 budget. However, significant challenges remain, and further reforms will be needed to ensure fiscal stability, particularly in the face of potential economic shocks in the coming years.”

The unions’ plan of action is not up to the task of overthrowing the government. In reality they don’t want that to happen. This is the meaning of the ‘long-term’ perspective given by the union tops:

“We are involved in a marathon. Our fight is a long fight. We will not stop protesting in the next years…”

But the inevitable new attacks in the coming period can push the working class and its unions to fight back in a surprising manner, and could provoke the fall of the government. It is no accident that the five-week-long general strike of the winter of 1960-61 has returned to the conversations of a layer of politically advanced youth and workers. Whatever the immediate outcome of the class struggle, a new layer of students and workers are drawing very radical conclusions. They are the ones the Belgian section of the Revolutionary Communist International is reaching.