Assymmetric federation
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An asymmetric federation is a federation where one or more of the states has considerably more autonomy than the other substates, although they have the same constitutional status. The division of powers between substates is not symmetric.
Examples of this include Canada where Quebec has considerable independence where it comes to language and education policies (as do other provinces, which however make less use of this independence)[citation needed], and Malaysia where Sarawak and Sabah have retained their immigration controls. In Spain, which is either called an "imperfect federation"[1] or a "federation in all but its name"[2], the central government has granted different levels of autonomy to its substates, considerably more to Catalonia, the Basque Country and Galicia and considerably less to the others. Russia has 85 federal subjects which are granted different levels of power.
An asymmetric federation is similar to a federacy where a state where one of the substates enjoys considerably more independence than the others. The difference between an asymmetric federation and federacy is indistinct; a federacy is essentially an extreme case of an asymmetric federation, either due to large differences in the level of autonomy, or the rigidity of the constitutional arrangements. An asymmetric federation however has to have a federal constitution and all states in federation have the same formal status ("state"), while in a federacy independent substate has a different status ("autonomous region").
[edit] References
- Stepan, Alfred "Federalism and Democracy: Beyond the U.S. Model" in the Journal of Democracy 10:4 October 1999 can be accessed here
- ^ Moreno according to Lijphart, A. Patterns of Democracy (1999) Yale, p.191
- ^ Elazar, D.J. Federal Systems of the World: A Handbook of Federal, Confederal and Autonomy Arrangements (1991) Essex, p.228
