Political Science Constitutions, Structure & Systems of Government, Future of Nation-States
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Constitutions and the Structure of Government
Every country has a constitution of some sort that outlines the government’s structure. A constitution is simply the set of rules that govern how power is distributed and exercised. In other words, these rules structure the government of a state. Without such a set of rules, the state could not function and anarchy would reign. Although no constitution can cover every possible question or issue, all states need to spell out at least the fundamental matters of the distribution and use of power.
Written and Unwritten Constitutions
Some constitutions—such as that of the United States or the Basic Law of Germany—are codified into written documents. In other states, such as the United Kingdom, the constitution consists of many documents, laws, court rulings, and traditional practices that have never been compiled into a single document. But in every case, custom, history, and tradition play an important role.
Unwritten Rules of the United States
Although the U.S. Constitution is a written document, many of the keys to the American political system are not in it. Perhaps the best example is the power of judicial review—the authority to decide if a law is constitutional.The Supreme Court gave itself this power in the case of Marbury v. Madison (1803). Similarly, the role of political parties developed over time—and does not appear in the Constitution.
Constitutional Design
Strong constitutions share three characteristics, or principles, of constitution design:
- Attentive to tradition: People prefer rules that resemble past rules. They are unlikely to follow a new set of rules if it differs widely from what they are used to doing. This principle holds particularly true for customs that have existed for a long time.
- Open to change: A constitution should be amendable. Although it should not be too easy to change, making a constitution too rigid may straitjacket future leaders, who may deal with dramatically different circumstances.
Example: The U.S. Constitution has been amended nearly thirty times, allowing Americans to adapt their structure of government to changing mores, beliefs, and practices. The Bill of Rights was the first set of amendments. Other amendments include the Thirteenth Amendment, which made slavery illegal in 1865, and the Nineteenth Amendment, which gave women the right to vote in 1920.
- 3. A harness to personal ambition: In a good government, the leaders have a strong incentive to prioritize the country over personal ambition. A good, strong constitution creates a situation in which the leaders’ ambition leads them to work for the public good, not for personal gain. Without such incentives, rulers, elected or otherwise, may very well ignore the public good.
Although these three principles of constitutional design help ensure solid governmental structures, ultimately they are merely guidelines. Some successful constitutions do not include them, and a number of states have succeeded in imposing governments that differ greatly from tradition. Unfortunately, any radical departures from tradition or history usually require violence.
Example: After a fourteen-year war to gain independence from Portugal, Angola entered into a decades-long civil war to determine which ethnic political party would head the country. Intervention from other nation-states, which favored one party over another and wanted to see their favorite gain dominance, exacerbated the violence.
Length of Constitutions
Some constitutions are short documents. The U.S. Consti-tution, for example, covers only a few pages. Others are lengthy. The Basic Law of Germany, for example, is roughly five times as long as the U.S. Constitution. As a general rule, older constitutions are shorter than newer constitutions.
Example: In the United States, state constitutions are frequently far longer than the federal one, which was ratified in 1789. In part, this is because most state con-stitutions were written after the federal one. Even states that predate the federal Constitution have rewritten their constitutions, sometimes more than once.
The Longest Constitution
According to some estimates, the state of Alabama has the world’s longest constitution, with approximately 740 amendments.
The Advantages of Vagueness
Constitutions, particularly short ones, tend to be vague in their contents. Vague constitutions have two advantages:
- They easily adapt to changing circumstances. Social and political circumstances sometimes change very rapidly, and an excessively specific constitution can create problems if a new political era dawns.
- They foster cooperation. Vague constitutions encourage political leaders to work together to determine the specific policies through negotiation.
Example: The vague U.S. Constitution has encouraged political leaders to work together through congressional committees. These committees have become a hallmark of the American democratic process.
Systems of Government
A system of government distributes power among different parts and levels of the state. Political scientists study the uses of power, including how power is distributed within a state. The amount of power held by the central government determines the system of government a state has. There are three main systems of government used today: unitary systems, federal systems, and confederate systems.
| THREE SYSTEMS OF GOVERNMENT | |||
| System | Level of Centralization | Strength | Weakness |
| Unitary (e.g., China, France, Japan, United Kingdom) | High | Sets uniform policies that direct the entire nation | Disregards local differences |
| Federal (e.g., United States, Germany, Australia, Canada) | Medium | Gives local governments more power | Sacrifices national uniformity on some issues |
| Confederate (e.g., Confederate States of America, Belgium) | Low | Gives local/regional governments almost complete control | Sets no significant uniform national policies |
Unitary Systems
A unitary system has the highest degree of centralization. In a unitary state, the central government holds all the power. Lower-level governments, if they exist at all, do nothing but implement the policies of the national government. In a purely unitary state, the same set of laws applies throughout the nation, without variation. Unitary states create national policy, which is then applied uniformly. This uniformity sometimes serves as an advantage because people and businesses know exactly what to expect from the laws, regardless of geographical location. At the same time, to maintain its uniformity, a unitary government must overlook local differences that might call for different rules or policies.
Example: Most absolute monarchies and tyrannies operate under unitary systems. But democratic unitary states exist as well. In France, for example, the central government makes virtually all of the decisions.
Federal Systems
A federal system has a mix of national and state or local gov- ernments. The federal government usually trumps local governments in matters of defense and foreign policy, but local governments have a great deal of say over most other policy areas. Sometimes local governments administer national policies, which means that, in practice, the “national” policy varies a great deal from place to place.
Example: In the United States, state governments administered Aid to Families with Dependent Children (AFDC) throughout the length of the program, 1935–1997. Although the federal government set certain rules for how the money was to be spent, state governments had the power to administer it as they saw fit. Some states, therefore, gave little money through AFDC, whereas others were much more generous.
Often, the boundary between national and local power is blurred. Federal systems have the opposite strengths and weaknesses of unitary systems: They excel at factoring in local circumstances but often fail to have a coherent national policy.
Example: The United States, Mexico, and Canada operate under federal systems. These states have a mix of national and state governments that share power and policymaking responsibilities.
Confederate Systems
A confederate system sits at the other extreme in terms of centralization. A confederacy is a loose relationship among a number of smaller political units. The vast majority of political power rests with the local governments; the central federal government has very little power. Local governments have a great deal of freedom to act as they wish, but this freedom often leads to conflicts between states and the federal government. In some cases, a confederacy is little more than an alliance between independent states.
Example: For Americans, the Confederate States of America—which governed the South during the Civil War—is the best-known example of a confederacy, but there have been others. In fact, the first government of the United States, created by the Articles of Confederation (finished in 1777), was this type of system. Today, Belgium is basically a confederacy between two largely independent states, Flanders in the north and Wallonia in the south.
The Future of Nation-States
Although the nation-state has been the predominant unit of political organization for most of the last few centuries, its future is uncertain. Two trends point to the nation-state as receding in importance, but these trends sometimes contradict each other. Still, globalization and devolution continue to occur at a rapid rate throughout the twenty-first-century world, and both will affect the future of nation-states.
Globalization
The first major trend is globalization. Over the last few decades, national boundaries have broken down in a variety of ways, including economically. In today’s truly global economy, money and goods travel across borders in huge quantities and at great speed. Many corporations build parts in a variety of countries, then assemble them in yet another country. Most goods are no longer “made in America,” for example, because much of the manufacturing often happens in other places, whereas final assembly occurs in the United States. The rapid growth of international investing has further globalized the economy. Globalization often leads to transnationalism, so should this globalizing trend continue, the nation-state might give way to the transnational government.
The Perils of Globalization
Since the mid-1990s, people from around the world have attacked globalization. Environmentalists see globalization as a disaster for the environment, labor unions fear for their members’ jobs in a global marketplace, and others see globalization itself as a cause of poverty in developing countries. Most governments continue to favor globalization, but antiglobalization protesters have made their mark by demonstrating against meetings of the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund, and other international economic institutions. During the so-called Battle of Seattle in 1999, thousands of protesters swarmed the hotel and convention centers at which meetings of the World Trade Organization were being held.
Transnationalism
Transnationalism has also occurred at the political level. International organizations, such as the United Nations and the World Trade Organization, play an ever-increasing role on the political stage, and nations join them for such benefits as military protection and economic security. In the case of the European Union, national boundaries have very little meaning. All citizens can travel, live, and work freely throughout the European Union, and all internal tariffs and trade restrictions have been abolished. Some residents see themselves as citizens of a new European Union nation, not of their smaller countries. Transnational governments and groups literally transcend geographical and political boundaries.
Example: The World Trade Organization, the United Nations, and the World Bank are just a few examples of international organizations that sometimes act like governments or play a substantial role in international relations. Other examples include the Organization of American States, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, and the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries.
The fact that increasing numbers of people around the world speak the same language demonstrates the transnational trend. English has become something of an international language, but other languages (such as French, Chinese, and Russian) are also spoken by many around the world. Overall, the total number of languages spoken is decreasing, while the total number of speakers of certain dominant languages is increasing.
Devolution
The second trend that marks the recession of nation-states concerns the increase in political power being given to local governments, sometimes to the point of autonomy. This trend is sometimes called devolution because states are said to devolve power back to local governments. In the United Kingdom, for example, Scotland has been granted a great deal of autonomy, as has Catalonia in Spain. Should this trend continue, local governments would replace national or central governments.
New Federalism
Since the 1970s, a number of American presidents have pursued a policy sometimes called new federalism. Supporters feel that the federal government has gotten too powerful and that more power should be given to state and local governments. Although the federal government remains strong, more power has been given back to state and local governments. In the 1990s, for example, Congress created block grants that gave money to states with few strings attached. States were also given more freedom to experiment with policies, such as Wisconsin’s experiment with welfare reform under Governor Tommy Thompson in 1996.
The table below summarizes the trends of globalization and devolution.
| GLOBALIZATION AND DEVOLUTION TRENDS | ||
| Globalization | Devolution | |
| Power flows | Outward, away from the state | Inward, down from the central government |
| Power belongs to | International organizations and transnational governments | Regional and local governments |
| Power is lost by | The state | The central government |
| Sometimes known as | Transnationalism | Subnationalism |
| Examples | The European Union, the United Nations, the World Trade Organization | New Federalism in the United States, increased Scottish autonomy in the United Kingdom, in-creased study of local and regional languages (such as Breton in France) |
Subnationalism
Accompanying devolution has been an increased identification with and interest in subnational groups. The prefix sub means “below” or “beneath,” so the term subnational indicates a smaller division of a larger national group. Many people are working to preserve the language, culture, and history of subnational groups. Some in France, for example, are learning to speak Breton, a language that had largely disappeared. In a number of countries, local dialects that were suppressed under dictatorial governments have reemerged after a transition to a more democratic government.
Example: With the breakup of the Soviet bloc in Eastern Europe in 1989, a number of subnationalities emerged. In the Baltic states, for example, students learned native languages rather than Russian. Czechoslovakia went so far as to split into the Czech Republic and Slovakia. In the Balkans, the emergence of subnationalism turned violent as Serbs, Croats, Slovenians, and others fought over the remains of Yugoslavia.
Predicting the Future
The future of nation-states is unclear. As trends, globalization and devolution contradict each other, so it seems unlikely that both will continue in significant ways. On the one hand, if globalization continues, then transnational governments or allegiances such as the European Union may eventually replace traditional nation-states. On the other hand, if devolution continues, powerful regional governments and subnational groups may come to dominate the political landscape. Then again, the nation-state has proven itself to be very durable throughout history. As the cliché goes, time will tell what the future holds for the nation-state.
