L’emploi des langues dans l’« espace délibératif » en Belgique, à la lumière de la jurisprudence de la Cour constitutionnelle

As part of the theme ‘Constitutional case law on the use of languages in parliaments sharing the French language’ of the 2025 Spring School in Parliamentary Studies, devoted to The use of languages in parliaments in the French-speaking world, this contribution proposes the notion of ‘deliberative space’ as a guideline for analysing the case law of the Belgian Constitutional Court on the relationship between ‘languages’ and ‘parliaments’. We will first present the constitutional framework relating to the use of languages in Belgium, combining the principle of linguistic freedom and the principle of territoriality, which govern the regulation of the use of languages in a Belgian territory divided into linguistic regions (I). We will then examine, through the prism of constitutional case law, two themes: the language of the law (II), and the language of deliberation in the municipal councils of peripheral municipalities (III). In the course of our analysis, we will look at various topics such as the use of languages in legislative matters and the possible divergence of language versions, the language groups within the legislative chambers for the adoption of so-called ‘special’ laws, the translation of texts into German, the status of the six communes in the Brussels periphery benefiting from linguistic ‘facilities’, and the constitutional case law relating to the use of languages in the councils of these communes.