Federalism Doomed? PDF Download

Author: Andreas Heinemann-Grüder
Publisher: Berghahn Books
ISBN: 9781571812070
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 292

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Book Description
Eleven articles, presented by Heinemann-Gruder (political science, Humboldt U., Germany) aim to explore the question of whether the use of federalist conceptions is appropriate in analyzing processes of integration and disintegration in Europe. The focus is on an institutionalist perspective on difficulties faced by specific forms of government and diverse national traditions when combined with federalism. Conceptual and comparative frameworks are provided, lessons from the collapse of the Eastern European federations are examined, and possible directions for European federalism are discussed. Annotation copyrighted by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR

Author: Donald F. Kettl
Publisher: Princeton University Press
ISBN: 0691234175
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 248

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Book Description
"As James Madison led America's effort to write its Constitution, he made two great inventions-the separation of powers and federalism. The first is more famous, but the second was most essential because, without federalism, there could have been no United States of America. Federalism has always been about setting the balance of power between the federal government and the states-and that's revolved around deciding just how much inequality the country was prepared to accept in exchange for making piece among often-warring states. Through the course of its history, the country has moved through a series of phases, some of which put more power into the hands of the federal government, and some rested more power in the states. Sometimes this rebalancing led to armed conflict. The Civil War, of course, almost split the nation permanently apart. And sometimes it led to political battles. By the end of the 1960s, however, the country seemed to have settled into a quiet agreement that inequality was a prime national concern, that the federal government had the responsibility for addressing it through its own policies, and that the states would serve as administrative agents of that policy. But as that agreement seemed set, federalism drifted from national debate, just as the states began using their administrative role to push in very different directions. The result has been a rising tide of inequality, with the great invention that helped create the nation increasingly driving it apart"--

Author: Robert F. Nagel
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 9780195347975
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 228

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Book Description
At a time of unprecedented national power, why do so many Americans believe that our nationhood is fragile and precarious? Why the talk--among politicians, academics, and jurists--of "coups d'etat," of culture wars, of confederation, of constitutional breakdown? In this wide-ranging book, Robert Nagel proposes a surprising znswer: that anxiety about national unity is caused by centralization itself. Moreover, he proposes that this anxiety has dangerous cultural consequences that are, in an implosive cycle, pushing the country toward ever greater centralization. Carefully examining recent landmark Supreme Court cases that protect states' rights, Nagel argues that the federal judiciary is not leading and is not likely to lead a revival of the complex system called federalism. A robust version of federalism requires appreciation for political conflict and respect for disagreement about constitutional meaning, both values that are deeply antithetical to the Court's function. That so many believe this most centralized of our Nation's institutions is protecting, even overprotecting, state power is itself a sign of the depletion of those understandings necessary to sustain the federal system. Instead of a support for federalism, Nagel finds a commitment to radical nationalism throughout the constitutional law establishment. He traces this commitment to traditionally American traits like perfectionism, optimism, individualism, and legalism. Under modern conditions of centralization, these attractive traits are leading to unattractive social consequences, including tolerance, fearfulness, utopianism, and deceptiveness. They are degrading our political discourse. All this encourages further centralization and further cultural deterioration. This book puts the major federalism decisions within the framework of the Court's overall record, including its record on individual rights in areas like abortion, homosexuality, and school desegregation. And, giving special attention to public debate over privacy and impeachment, it places modern constitutional law in the context of political discourse more generally.

Author: Daniel Ziblatt
Publisher: Princeton University Press
ISBN: 9780691121673
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 246

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Book Description
This study explores the following puzzle: Upon national unification, why was Germany formed as a federal state and Italy a unitary state? Ziblatt's answer to this question will be of interest to scholars of international relations, comparative politics, political development, and political and economic history.

Author: Jamila Michener
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 1108245323
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 239

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Book Description
Medicaid is the single largest public health insurer in the United States, covering upwards of 70 million Americans. Crucially, Medicaid is also an intergovernmental program that yokes poverty to federalism: the federal government determines its broad contours, while states have tremendous discretion over how Medicaid is designed and implemented. Where some locales are generous and open handed, others are tight-fisted and punitive. In Fragmented Democracy, Jamila Michener demonstrates the consequences of such disparities for democratic citizenship. Unpacking how federalism transforms Medicaid beneficiaries' interpretations of government and structures their participation in politics, the book examines American democracy from the vantage point(s) of those who are living in or near poverty, (disproportionately) Black or Latino, and reliant on a federated government for vital resources.

Author: Soeren Keil
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1317093437
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 232

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Book Description
In 1995 none of the political parties representing the peoples of Bosnia preferred a federal option. Yet, Bosnia became a federal state, highly decentralised and with a complex institutional architecture. This solution was imposed on them by international actors as a result of peace negotiations following the Yugoslav wars. Political parties in post-war Bosnia were not willing to identify with or accept the federation. The international community intervened taking over key decisions and so Bosnia and Herzegovina became the first state to experience a new model of federalism, namely ’imposed federalism’ and a new model of a federal state, that of the ’internationally administered federation’. By combining comparative politics, conflict analysis and international relations theory Soeren Keil offers a unique analysis of federalism in post-Dayton Bosnia and Herzegovina. By exploring this model of ’imposed federalism’ not only does this study greatly contribute to the literature on developments in Bosnia and Herzegovina it also re-evaluates comparative federalism in theory and practice. This study also offers important conclusions for similar cases, both in the Western Balkans region and the wider world, where international involvement and federalism as a method of conflict resolution in diverse societies becomes ever more prevalent and important.

Author: Cameron Ross
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 113407557X
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 323

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Book Description
With articles by a high quality set of contributors, including Richard Sakwa, Darrell Slider and Vladimir Gel’man, this book explores the increasingly authoritarian character of Putin’s rule, especially in his second term since 2004.

Author: Andrea Bosco
Publisher: Cambridge Scholars Publishing
ISBN: 1527554457
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 436

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Book Description
The European Union is facing today the greatest crisis since its creation. Brexit could mean not only the reversal of its steady enlargement—from 6 to 28 member states—but also the beginning of an inexorable decline leading to its disintegration. However, few today seem to recollect that it was precisely the British who were the first to promulgate the political culture which inspired the European Union’s construction—democracy and federalism—and the first who tried to realise, in June 1940, a European federation on the basis of an Anglo-French union. This volume traces the fundamental stages of the European unification process, placing it in relation to the wider process of world economic and political integration. In particular, it analyses the historical significance of the European Revolution, which is identified in the overcoming of the nation state—namely the modern political formula which institutionalised the political division of mankind—and the birth of the first truly international state. The universal historical significance of the European Revolution lies in its exportability—as for the other great European revolutions—and, therefore, its potential as progressively extensible to all the states of the planet. Europe was indeed the first region of the world where the barriers between national states fell, and a post-national political identity emerged, complementary to national political identities. It is, in fact, in the context of the European Union that democracy beyond the borders of the nation state has first been realized, constituting a guiding principle for global governance.

Author: Jan Erk
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1135228922
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 257

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Book Description
This book compares and explores different aspects and perspectives of federalism studies, providing an analytical framework which transcends the sub-fields and encourages contributors to look beyond their own disciplinary approaches to the topic.

Author: Theodore Konstadinides
Publisher: Kluwer Law International B.V.
ISBN: 9041126155
Category : Law
Languages : en
Pages : 354

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Book Description
The European Union has flourished and expanded over the last fifty years as a unique system that lies midway between a federal state and an anarchical international system. Different actors coexist within a cooperative hegemony of Member States, and the allocation of competences and decision-making among them has always been at the centre of the integration process. In fact, demands for clearer limits to the Unionand’s decision-making power and enduring tension over the nature and purpose of European integration have been the key drivers of integration and change. This deeply informed and thoughtful book thoroughly examines the manner in which the principle of division of powers has developed in EU Law over the course of European integration, and casts light on the path towards a more efficient delimitation of internal competence between the main actors: namely, the European Union and the Member States. Among the topics investigated in depth are the following: the place of the and‘competence provisionsand’ in the current and future EU Treaty structure; the scope and limits of the powers of institutional actors involved in EU decision-making; the contribution of the Court of Justice in declaring the pre-emptive effect and overarching precedence of Community law; the role of subsidiarity as a tool for monitoring the jurisdictional limits of the Communityand’s legislative competence; areas where and‘creeping competenceand’ occurs; the constitutional checks and balances available to Member States against unprecedented expansion of EU competences; and the spectre of a powerful and‘coreand’ Europe and a and‘multi-speedand’ Europe of pacesetters and laggards. Addressing numerous crucial issues and– among them the degree of permanence of the nation-state in a context of ambiguous constitutional authority, and the width of the democratic base of the Unionand’s and‘institutional dynamicand’ of cooperation and consensus and– the author lucidly describes a seeming paradox: an and‘ever-closer unionand’, with a growing democratic legitimacy, congruent with a supranational community that falls short of a fully-fledged democratic political entity. The countless perspectives and clarifications discovered along the way are sure to engage academics and policymakers working in the fields of the European integration project, and will provide ample insights and food for thought.