Paul Dirkx starts his article with two observations: firstly, in Belgium there is no strict distinction between translational activities and meta-translational activities; secondly, translation studies (meta-translational activities) in Belgium displays considerable stagnation. Basing himself on Bourdieu, the author is convinced that analysing the stagnation and placing it in a historic-scientific context will solve it. In the first paragraph the author sketches the historical evolution of the study-object, i.e. translation production from the Dutch system into the French system. The second paragraph describes the evolution of translation studies. The third paragraph delineates the author’s research and its object. In the concluding paragraph the author points out that in Belgium literary translation does not positively stimulate image and ideology building between the two language communities. He states that the lack of both translation and comparative studies almost blocks the translation production.