Flanders (region, Belgium)

Flanders (region, Belgium) or Flemish Region (Dutch Vlanderen), administrative and language region in northern Belgium, consisting of five provinces: West Flanders, East Flanders, Antwerpen, Limburg, and Flemish Brabant. The region is bordered on the west by France and the North Sea, on the north and east by the Netherlands, and to the south by the region of Wallonia. The western part of the administrative region of Flanders encompasses the core of historic Flanders, which figured prominently in the economic and cultural life of northwestern Europe in the Middle Ages. See Flanders (historic region).

The Flanders region consists of primarily low coastal plains and plateaus, including areas of polders (lands reclaimed from the sea) along the coast. Most of the region is relatively flat. Elevations range from sea level in coastal regions to 200 m (655 ft) on the southern plateaus. A number of rivers drain from these higher southern plateau regions into the Schelde River (also called the Escaut), which flows past the city of Antwerp to the North Sea. Flanders contains a number of large cities, including Antwerp, Ghent (Gent), Kortrijk (Courtrai), and Brugge (Bruges). The city of Brussels, the capital of Belgium, is an enclave within the boundaries of Flanders. Brussels has separate regional status in Belgium, but also functions as the administrative capital of Flanders. Flanders is inhabited predominantly by a people called Flemings, who officially speak Dutch, although residents of Belgium often refer to the language as Flemish (see Flemish Language). Small concentrations of French speakers live in the districts around Brussels and along the border with Wallonia, where French is the primary language.

Flanders has long been one of Europe’s major economic centers. Brugge was an international trading and textile center as early as the 13th century, and Antwerp has been a major commercial center and port since the 15th century. During the 19th and early 20th centuries, Ghent, Antwerp, and Kortrijk became important industrial centers, and coal mining was developed farther east. Nonetheless, until World War II (1939-1945), the Belgian economy was centered around the region of Wallonia to the south. During the second half of the 20th century, a surge of foreign investment in the corridor between Antwerp and Brussels led to significant growth in Flanders' engineering and high-technology sectors, and to the explosive increase of the service sector. That corridor is now the economic heart not only of Flanders, but of Belgium as a whole.

The historic Flanders region was an economic power during much of the Middle Ages, and included parts of what are now the Netherlands and France. When Belgium gained its independence in 1830, it retained from this historic region only the area that became the provinces of East and West Flanders. With the rise of disputes over language rights in Belgium in the 20th century, Flemish activists pressed for territorial autonomy for all of northern Belgium. The region of Flanders was formally recognized in the early 1960s, when the country was partitioned along historic language lines (with the exception of the city and suburbs of Brussels). Between 1970 and 1993 constitutional revisions transformed Belgium into a federal state, with most governmental authority devolving to Flanders and the other two administrative regions, Wallonia and Brussels. Area, 13,522 sq km (5,221 sq mi); population 6,117,440 (2007 estimate).