Nova Civitas
Nova Civitas was a Flemish think tank based on the principles of classic liberalism in combination with Anglo-Saxon conservativism. Nova Civitas claimed at its founding to be completely independent, although it was recognized and supported by the Flemish Liberal Party. The foundingchairman of Nova Civitas, Boudewijn Bouckaert, was a former board member of the VLD.
According to their website, the basic principles of Nova Civitas were :
*that freedom is linked to responsibility;
- that the family must be revalorized as a cornerstone of a free society;
- that the economy should be de-feodalized, and the free entrepreneurship should be protected;
- that the rule of law must be upheld.
— Nova Civitas website
Nova Civitas was founded in 1992 in the tradition of the Von Mises Institute from the 1980s as a new political club to support the rebirth of a strong liberal movement in Belgium dominated by the VLD in Flanders and the PRL in Wallonia. Nova Civitas was headquartered in Ghent. In 2004, a new regional committee was created in Antwerp and in 2006 one in Brussels.
Nova Civitas opposed what it called the socialist welfare state and advocated further transfers of comptetence for the federal to the regional levels. Nova Civitas also proposed a regrouping of political forces into a two party-system, with a big centre-right/right-wing political party alliance in Flanders, including VLD at its' head, CD&V, N-VA and Vlaams Belang. At the time, this created a controversy, and several Nova Civitas-members were rebuked by the VLD Statutory Committee. The two federal Senators and NC-members Hugo Coveliers and Jean-Marie Dedecker were even forced to leave the VLD in the wake of the ensuing turmoil.
After the 2006 dismissal of Dedecker from the VLD, Hugo Coveliers, Jean-Marie Dedecker and Boudewijn Bouckaert (along with several other Nova Civitas members) started negotiations to form a new "right-liberal" party, but Dedecker and Bouckaert eventually joined the N-VA. After protest by the christian-democrate cartel partners of N-VA in the days following their membership, the two liberals were forced to leave the N-VA again. Together, they founded the think tank Cassandra. In 2007, after Jean-Marie Dedecker started his own political party, the eponymous List Dedecker (Dutch: Lijst Dedecker), Cassandra served as the ideological laboratory of the party, but became increasingly critical of what it considered a lack of internal democracy and accountability of the party.
In 2009, both Cassandra and Nova Civitas fell victim of internal disputes, and decided to disband themselves. A new classical liberal think tank was founded by the remnants: LIBERA!.
From 2003 to 2009, Nova Civitas also granted an annual award, the prestigious Prize for Liberty or Liberty Award.
- 2003: Luuk van Middelaar (a Dutch historian and philosopher)
- 2004: Ayaan Hirsi Ali (from 2003-2006 a member of the Dutch Parliament, defending religious freedom)
- 2005: Matthias Storme (a Flemish professor at the University of Leuven)
- 2006: Alain Destexhe (a Belgian French-speaking senator)
- 2007: Derk-Jan Eppink (a Dutch columnist and journalist)
- 2008: Urbain Servranckx (Urbanus, a Belgian independent-minded comedian)
- 2009: Mark Grammens (a Belgian independent journalist)
From 2010 on, LIBERA! has been awarding the Prize for Liberty.
- 2010: Frits Bolkestein (a former Dutch politician and European Commissioner, defending open markets)
- 2011: Theodore Dalrymple (a British conservative author and social critic)