External and Internal Challenges to the Federal Bargain

Abstract

The proclaimed goal of federal systems is an institutionalized balance between national unity and subnational diversity; national unity is maintained and asserted with respect to foreign nations and other major issues whereas subnational diversity is maintained and asserted with respect to the national center or national majority. The drafters of federal constitutions hope to achieve balance as well as intra-federal cooperation by dividing political power territorially between one national government which has authority in one sphere of responsibility involving the entire national territory and several constituent territorial governments which administer their respective areas in another sphere of responsibility. The two territorial jurisdictions are meant to be separate yet interdependent. Such a system can and often does ensure cooperative partnership but obviously it cannot guarantee it. A serious conflict sometimes issues from the very fact that political power has been territorially divided as well as interlocked. Of course, the possibility of either cooperation or conflict characterizes not only federalism but all political systems and institutions invented by men.