Confederation
Confederation refers to a political system in which independent states or regions form a union while retaining their sovereignty. This union typically involves a central governing body with limited powers, leaving most authority to the individual states. Confederations are characterized by a decentralized structure and a focus on cooperation among member entities.
4 Key excerpts on "Confederation"
eBook - ePubEuropean Disintegration
A Search for Explanations
- Hans Vollaard(Author)
- 2018(Publication Date)
- Palgrave Macmillan(Publisher)
...Federalism refers to the pragmatic or ideological advocacy of “balancing of citizen preferences for (a) joint action for certain purposes and (b) self-government of the constituent units for other purposes” (Watts, 1998, p. 120). Thus, federalism is actually a normative-philosophical concept that relates to the promotion of federal principles (Burgess, 2006, p. 2). The concept of a “federal political system” is a general, descriptive term that denotes a combination of shared rule and self-rule, by which Watts refers to the well-known, succinct definition of a federal system put forward by Daniel Elazar (1987). This concept encompasses a wide variety of species, from leagues and unions to federations and Confederations, and hybrids of these species. As such, a federation can be seen as a species under the general genus of federal political system. A federation is defined by Watts (1998, p. 121) as “a compound polity combining constituent units and a general government, each possessing powers delegated to it by the people through a constitution, each empowered to deal directly with the citizens in the exercise of a significant portion of its legislative, administrative, and taxing powers, and each directly elected by its citizens”. Despite the wide variety in the way federations are formally organised and actually operate, a list can be made of characteristics that federations usually exhibit. A federation is a state (Burgess, 2000, p. 268; Forsyth, 2007, p. 150). A bicameral legislature at the federal level guarantees the representation of the single people, as well as that of the various member states. This distribution of power over the various layers of government is laid down in a constitution. Neither of the levels of government are subordinate to each other. Changes to the constitution require assent by special majorities at the various levels of government. A federal judiciary acts as an umpire vis-à-vis the distribution of power...
- Felix Bonjour(Author)
- 2018(Publication Date)
- Routledge(Publisher)
...The federal idea should predominate in doubtful cases. Moreover, one must be careful not to outrun public opinion, or, as E. Rambert said, not to exceed the degree of centralization or unification compatible with the spirit of the age. ‘Some measures of centralization which have made their appearance prematurely have been carried twenty, thirty or forty years after their first rejection. If progress is to be generally acceptable, it must be slow and free, and the people must have time to adapt themselves to the new order. The less the Confederation develops into a bureaucracy, the more chance it will have of escaping unpopularity and resistance. Whenever it can make use of the cantonal organization, it should do so, even at the cost of some inconvenience. Finally, it must shun like the Devil anything which might be construed as an attack upon that precious equality of the national languages which is one of the very foundations of our union.’ M. Virgile Rossel summed up exactly the guiding principle of a sound federal policy when he wrote in a recent article in La Bibliothèque universelle : ‘Every act of centralization which is not ruled by the supreme aims of the State saps the strength of true equality among the races, and excites distrust and bitterness fatal to federal goodwill. Switzerland loses in union what she gains in unity.’ Evidently the federal or federative State is a somewhat complicated institution in which the statesman can only succeed by means of compromise. Nevertheless I consider it the political system of the future. Many great countries seem to be tending towards a federative organization. It is so with the British Empire; it may be so with Russia, Austria-Hungary and the Balkan States. At the moment, the Swiss Confederation—the oldest of all—and the United States of America represent the completest types of this political organization. They are, and have long been, free and democratic Confederations...
eBook - ePubConstitutional Politics and the Territorial Question in Canada and the United Kingdom
Federalism and Devolution Compared
- Michael Keating, Guy Laforest, Michael Keating, Guy Laforest(Authors)
- 2017(Publication Date)
- Palgrave Macmillan(Publisher)
...These are certainly relevant, but the definition of optimal can depend on the values and aims of whoever is making the judgement. For some, the aim is preserving the federation or union as a value in itself, while others see the federated or devolved level as the locus of the demos and the starting point. Some favour extensive territorial and interpersonal redistribution and a large welfare state, while others are more inclined to the market economy and competition. In the United States, those in favour of a larger state and extensive social provision usually prefer a strong federal government. Those looking to a smaller state and reduced welfare, are for states rights. In the United Kingdom and Canada, matters are complicated, with centralizers and decentralizers on both left and right. Procedures for constitutional reform differ across federal and devolved systems but both Canada and the United Kingdom now involve the federated units themselves in the process, Canada by constitutional law and the UK by convention. As more actors are drawn into the constitutional game, veto points multiply and comprehensive agreements become more difficult to reach. This is particularly so in plurinational states, where nationalists both at the state and the federated level start from different premises and neither is ready to resolve issues definitively when there is a possibility of making progress in later rounds. The intergovernmental nature of constitutional negotiations and their protracted character can marginalize citizens and create disenchantment. Hence there has been a search for ways to re-engage citizens and to give them the last say in constitutional matters. Yet this in turn creates difficulties in creating a deliberative framework for shaping the options...
eBook - ePub- Lynn Dobson, Andreas Follesdal, Lynn Dobson, Andreas Follesdal(Authors)
- 2004(Publication Date)
- Routledge(Publisher)
...2 The EU as a self-sustaining federation Specifying the constitutional conditions David McKay Introduction The extension of powers implicit in recent European Union (EU) treaties, and especially the Treaty on European Union (Maastricht), have led a number of scholars to view the EU as a nascent federation and to draw comparisons with existing federations (see, for example, Burgess 2000; McKay 2001; Nicolaidis and Howse 2001). As with the established literature on federalism, much of this opus dwells on questions of definition. Deleting the word ‘federal’ from Article 1 of the final draft of the EU Constitution and replacing it with the words ‘a union of European states’ might suggest that the EU is something other than a federal state, and indeed no one claims that the EU is a fully developed federation such as the USA or Switzerland. However the EU does meet the minimal definition of a species of federal-like state as elaborated by Riker and others. Hence Riker argues that federalism is a ‘political organisation in which the activities of government are divided between regional governments and a central government in such a way that each kind of government has some activities in which it makes final decisions’ (Riker 1975: 101; see also McKay 2001, Chapter 2). Riker also accepts that some federations are ‘peripheralized’ because the powers of the central government are temporally or functionally limited in such a way that can give individual states an incentive to secede. Such was sometimes the case with the early Swiss Confederation or with the USA under the Articles of Confederation. Hence at certain points in Swiss history when the external threat to the Confederation was low, some cantons calculated that the costs of contributing to the national defence were not worth paying. No federal sanctions were in place to punish secessionists, nor could the federation reward cantons with relevant collective defence (see the discussion in Bonjour et al...
