Federal State

6 Key excerpts on "Federal State"

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  Territories

  The Claiming of Space

  • David Storey(Author)
  • 2012(Publication Date)
  • Routledge

    (Publisher)

  At a basic level, a differentiation can be made between centralized states and Federal States. In the former, power resides almost exclusively with central government with only a minor role, if any, for regional or local bodies; in the latter, various powers may be devolved to regional or provincial governments. In a Federal State, such as the United States or Germany, regional governments have a considerable degree of autonomy and can pass local laws. In contrast, highly centralized states have a system in which the degree of local devolution may be quite minimal. Obviously, many countries adopt political systems which exist on a spectrum between highly centralized and highly devolved. In the following sections, a brief discussion of Federal States and local government is provided. While these spatial arrangements exist primarily for administrative purposes, it needs to be remembered that territorial divisions at this scale, just as with those referred to in previous chapters, may also inculcate a particular sense of place identity. The recent trend of rolling back the state in some Western democracies is briefly discussed, followed by a theoretical appraisal of decentralization.

  Federated States

  The most devolved political–territorial systems are in Federal States in which a significant amount of decision-making is carried out at a local level. Federalism is a political arrangement often favoured in multi-ethnic states. The ostensible aim is to ensure a reasonable balance between national and regional interests and (usually) between the various ethnic groups living within the confines of the state. Federal States can be seen, in many respects, as offering a practical response to tensions which might otherwise undermine the state’s continued existence. Ethno-regional groupings are accorded power over their region within an overall federal system. In some instances, complex systems have evolved to try to deal with a multiplicity of ethnic, religious and/or regional tensions, as in India and Nigeria. In the latter case, more and more federal units have been created since independence and, as noted in Chapter 4 , a sense of a unified Nigerian identity has been undermined by deep regional tensions. Some countries favour relatively large federal units, as in India, others favour very small units as in the Swiss cantons.

  An obvious example of a federated structure is the Russian Federation, which consists of a range of what can be seen as virtually separate countries bound together under the overarching authority of the Moscow government. Within the Russian Federation, there is a complex arrangement of over 80 different types of federal unit, some of which enjoy greater autonomy than others (Figure 7.1). Ultimately, what makes these territorial units something less than fully independent states, in the sense indicated in Chapter 3

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  Politics: A Complete Introduction: Teach Yourself

  • Peter Joyce(Author)
  • 2015(Publication Date)
  • Teach Yourself

    (Publisher)

  Sub-national governments are subject to considerable variation. A key distinction concerns the autonomy that such units enjoy. In Federal States such as Germany, Australia or America, power is divided between national (or federal) government and the constituent units of government. The division of responsibilities is provided for in a single source, usually a written constitution, which allocates specific functions to each sphere of government. Each enjoys autonomy in its own area of jurisdiction, which means that one may not intrude into the operations of the other. There may also be functions that are exercised jointly by both tiers of government.

  The alternative to a Federal State is a unitary one. In unitary states, political power is centralized in the hands of the national government. Countries including the United Kingdom, Sweden and France possess such forms of government. However, unitary states often possess a unit of government that is intermediate between national and local government. These are usually regional bodies, which provide services for a relatively wide geographic area where the inhabitants share some form of common identity such as language, culture or race. Regional authorities vary according to the autonomy they possess: some exercise power that is devolved from national government, thus giving them a wide degree of control over such delegated responsibilities, while others merely function as administrative bodies whose role is to provide regional services according to guidelines laid down by national government.

  In both federal and unitary states a range of services are provided by subordinate authorities, termed ‘local government’, whose activities will be discussed later in this chapter. Federalism

  Key idea (3)

  Federalism possesses advantages derived from localities being empowered to run their own affairs. But there are also difficulties, especially in connection with the division of powers in federal political structures.

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  German politics today

  Third edition

  • Geoffrey Roberts(Author)
  • 2016(Publication Date)
  • Manchester University Press

    (Publisher)

  6 The federal structure

  The development of the federal system

  The name of the German state – the Federal Republic of Germany – indicates and emphasises one of its fundamental characteristics: its federal structure. This means that sovereign authority is shared between the federation itself and the component Länder, as described in the Basic Law. Unlike the United States, Canada, Australia, India or Brazil, all Federal States which cover very extensive territory, the Federal Republic is not particularly large in area – smaller than France or Spain, and not much larger than Italy – so why should it be organised as a federation, when France, for example, is not? There are two principal reasons.

  First, when the political arrangements for the Federal Republic were being debated in 1948–49, the members of the Parliamentary Council had to accept that the Länder were already in existence as political structures (and, indeed, the members of the Parliamentary Council had themselves been selected by those Länder). Even had there been any pressure to create a unitary state for other reasons, the existence of Land parliaments, Land governments, Land constitutions and Land party systems would have made such a step unthinkable. The politicians and the public would not have consented to the abolition of the already-functioning Länder political systems. The force of tradition also had influence. Even before the unification of Germany in 1871, a number of confederal and federal associations of German states had existed, ranging from Napoleon’s Confederation of the Rhine, formed in 1806 and the Customs Union (Zollverein) in 1833, to the North German Confederation (formed in 1867), which preceded the unification of Germany (see Chapter 1 ). The Second Empire, the regime of the newly-unified Germany that was created in 1871, was organised as a Federal State, in which the formerly independent states such as Bavaria, Saxony, Württemberg and of course Prussia itself, with their heterogeneous cultures, political and legal arrangements, could be accommodated. The Weimar Republic, Germany’s first democratic regime, had been created as a Federal State, even though the role of the Länder was always very secondary, and the state structure became increasingly centralised over the lifetime of the regime. The zonal post-war occupation regimes had been organised on the basis of Länder in 1945–46. Indeed, this tradition of federalism also left its impact on the institutions of the Federal Republic, such as the structure and powers of the Bundesrat (see below and Chapter 8

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  American Civilization

  An Introduction

  • David Mauk, Alf Tomas Tønnessen, John Oakland(Authors)
  • 2021(Publication Date)
  • Routledge

    (Publisher)

  Chapter 7 Political institutions

  State and local government

  • The place of state government in American federalism
  • The evolution of state government and federalism in the US
  • The structure of state government
  • Local government
  • Exercises
  • Further reading
  • Websites

  Both advocates and critics of the European Union have compared it to a “United States of Europe.” Europeans grapple with dilemmas of constitutionality and government structure similar to those weighed by the drafters of the Constitution of 1787. The vastly different historical situation of European nations today makes comparison dubious. Nonetheless, political leaders in both times and places wrestle with issues of how the EU and the US should balance power between the federal and the national (“state” in the US) governments. How should we maintain sovereignty, control the movement of people in and out of borders and deal with tensions that threaten the stability of federal unions? As Presidents Trump and Biden struggled with the states’ desperate needs for medical and economic aid during the COVID pandemic, issues of the balance of power and responsibility in American federalism became prominent.

  The answers the founding fathers gave to these and related questions defined the particular brand of federalism originally established in the US. Such issues are not decided finally, however. They are part of an ongoing debate about the nature and purposes of government. The answers given at different times provide a map of the evolving character of American federalism and state and local government in the US.

  The place of state government in American federalism

  One whole article of the Constitution is devoted to the states. Article IV recognizes the sovereignty of the states by denying federal authorities the power to alter the boundaries of existing states without their permission. A federal capital, Washington, DC, became a reality only because the states of Maryland and Virginia agreed to give up some of their territory to create the District of Columbia. Constitutional procedures for the admission of new states on an equal footing (having “full faith and credit”) with the original 13 and a clause guaranteeing them a republican form of government recognize states

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  Federalism and Political Culture

  • Aaron Wildavsky, Aaron Wildavsky(Authors)
  • 2021(Publication Date)
  • Routledge

    (Publisher)

  2 There remained the good feeling that American pragmatism had apparently triumphed over arid theory. The question of what exactly to call it was, for a time, superseded by calling it good. So long as a few bands of dark were still visible against the white, there was sufficient resolution to say it was something. We could have our federal cake (color me marble!) and eat it too. As government grew and as research became more sophisticated, swirls of marble gave way to veins going every which way, so criss-crossed that no one could say what was up or down or who was (simultaneously?) on top or bottom. How could we enjoy federal structure if we did not know what it was? The seemingly arcane disputes about a formula for designating the degree of federalism hid a deeper dilemma, for the political sociology of federalism fared no better, indeed worse, than the political geometry. After all, there was still the structure—states existed; senators could only come from states; and representatives ran in districts within states or the District of Columbia. But where was the social glue?

  The social study of federalism talked about state and regional interests but rarely about values and practices.3 It was assumed that American political cultures were compatible with (and were the expression of) the variety and diversity necessary to maintain a federal system. A belief in uniformity, for instance, could be manifested by strong central rule, modified by delegating authority to geographic units. This delegation, though it belongs to a unitary conception of government, is often called decentralization. Noncentralization refers to independent centers of power in geographic areas who do (and are expected to) differentiate themselves. Though there may be some centralization in a federal system, and there might be decentralization (i.e., delegation), there must be noncentralization. A belief in equality, not only of opportunity but of outcome, would be hostile to noncentralization, for then there could be no substantial differences among states.

  Uniformity is antithetical to federalism. The existence of states free to disagree with one another and with the central government inevitably leads to differentiation. Yet states must differ if they are to do more than obey central directives. Were there to be a change in values toward equality of condition, the political culture that undergirds federalism would fall apart. You can have a belief in equality of opportunity to be different, but you cannot have a belief in equality of results to be the same and still have a federal system.

  The special subject of political sociologists has been political parties. Though national parties were weak by European standards, parties in America were the only nationwide social support for the institutional structure of federalism. The decline of parties has not so much left sociologists unemployed as bereft of a rationale for why the unadorned federal structure should work as well as some of them supposed.

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  Global Politics

  A New Introduction

  • Jenny Edkins, Maja Zehfuss, Jenny Edkins, Maja Zehfuss(Authors)
  • 2019(Publication Date)
  • Routledge

    (Publisher)

  The physical maps show a world that has changed little in human history, although our knowledge of it certainly has. The political maps though bear almost no relation to the situation a few hundred years ago, let alone a few thousand. Territorial changes were common until the 1940s, many new states emerged from the process of decolonisation after the Second World War, and certain areas – notably eastern Europe and central Asia – will have dramatically changed in the past 30 years. The final settlement of some areas remains an issue today.

  Taking this kind of perspective shows us that the division of the world into separate territorial units, called states, is both artificial and arbitrary. Today it is generally accepted as the norm for political and geographical organisation. Yet this has not always been the case. Looking at older maps shows a very different perspective. Until relatively recently, large parts of the world were either unknown entirely (such as desert, mountain or polar regions), unknown to people in other parts, or known to them only in the vaguest of ways. Land masses and key rivers appeared on maps of the world drawn in Europe, but the inland areas of islands or continents were largely undiscovered by Europeans and unmapped by them.

  Although this division of the world into states is accepted as the norm, it does create problems in terms of tackling important issues, such as climate change: see Chapter 3 . This division also means that not everyone is authorised to live where they choose, creating many serious difficulties: see Chapter 10 . And it is arguably being challenged by the spread of the internet (Chapter 9 ) and a globalised economy and global financial institutions (Chapters 17 and 18 ).

  The division of the world into territorial units called states reflects a particular relation to space. Yet, just as not all human communities have been the same as modern states, so too with their relation to the land they inhabit. Hunter-gatherer communities have a very different relation to space than those societies that cultivate land and domesticate animals. They tend not to have fixed dwellings and may move with the seasons in search of water and food.

  Standard definitions of territory suggest that it is an area of space under the control or jurisdiction of a group of people, which might be a state, but which might potentially be other types of political organisation. Jean Gottmann notes that

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