President Benoît Lutgen Preceded by Christian Social Party | Founded 1968 Political position Centre to Centre-left | |
Headquarters National secretariat
Rue des Deux Églises, Brussels Ideology Christian democracy
Christian humanism
Centrism | ||
The Humanist Democratic Centre (French: Centre démocrate humaniste, cdH) is a Christian democratic French-speaking political party in Belgium. Until 2002, the party was known as the Christian Social Party (French: Parti Social Chrétien, PSC). The cdH currently participates in the Government of the Brussels-Capital Region, the Government of the French Community the Walloon Government, but no longer, following the May 2014 national elections, the Belgian federal government.
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History
The PSC was officially founded in 1972. The foundation was the result of the split of the unitary Christian Social Party–Christian People's Party (PSC-CVP) into the Dutch-speaking Christian People's Party (CVP) and the French-speaking Christian Social Party (PSC), following the increased linguistic tensions after the crisis at the University of Leuven in 1968. The PSC performed particularly badly in the 1999 general election. This was linked to several scandals, such as the escape of Marc Dutroux and the discovery of dioxine in chickens (the PSC was a coalition partner in the Dehaene government). The decline in votes was also explained by declining adherence to Catholicism. The party was confined to opposition on all levels of government.
The party started a process of internal reform. In 2001 a new charter of principles the "Charter of Democratic Humanism" was adopted and 2002 the party adopted a new constitution and a new name, Humanist Democratic Centre.
In the 2003 general election the party did not perform much better and was still confined to opposition. After the 2004 regional elections the party returned to power in Brussels, in Walloon Region and the French Community together with the Socialist Party and Ecolo in Brussels, and with the Socialist Party in Walloon Region and the French Community. The current president of the party is Joëlle Milquet.
In the 2007 general elections, the party won 10 out of 150 seats in the Chamber of Representatives and 2 out of 40 seats in the Senate.
In the 2010 general elections, the party lost one seat in the Chamber and kept its two seats in the Senate.
Ideology
Its ideology is the "democratic humanism, inspired by personalism inherited notably from christian humanism", which includes a centre-left policy towards the economy, supporting state interventionism and calling for the unity of Belgium.
Federal Parliament
Results for the Chamber of Representatives, in percentages for the Kingdom of Belgium.