The 2007–11 political crisis was a period of instability in Belgium. The issues that provoked the crisis included the question of state reform, and whether the electoral district Brussels-Halle-Vilvoorde should remain as a single electoral district, or be separated into two electoral districts. Following the 2007 elections there were 196 days of negotiations before a coalition could be formed. However, after the 2010 elections, there was an even longer period of 541 days’ negotiation before a coalition could be formed. During these negotiations, a wide variety of Belgian politicians took charge of the discussions, in a variety of political roles. Bart De Wever of the New Flemish Alliance was in charge of the talks from 17 June 2010 to 8 July 2010 in the role of informateur. The title of formateur is used in Belgium to refer to the person who steers negotiations about a coalition government. The job of an informateur is to conduct preliminary talks that will lay the groundwork for the subsequent work of a formateur.
After De Wever, Elio Di Rupo of the Socialist Party became pre-formateur, a title that also refers to someone who lays the groundwork for a formateur, but who is not identified as informateur since he may go on to become formateur or even prime minister himself (while informateurs are more properly regarded as actual or potential assistants to the formateur). Di Rupo was in charge of the talks until 3 September 2010, after which he was replaced by Danny Pieters and André Flahaut who were Presidents of the Senate and the Chamber of Representatives respectively. They were jointly referred to as mediators, rather than as formateurs, informateurs or pre-formateurs. When their talks collapsed on 5 October 2010, De Wever took charge of the talks once more, but now instead of being known as the informateur, he was the clarificator. From 21 October 2010 to 26 January 2011 Johan Vande Lanotte became mediator and the talks continued.