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Journal of Democracy 13.2 (2002) 95



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A New Look at Federalism


Countries with ethnic, linguistic, or religious divisions that substantially coincide with territorial boundaries confront special problems in making democracy work. They are vulnerable to intense intergroup conflict, which all too often leads to violence or to attempts at secession. One institutional device intended to mitigate such strains is federalism. Of course, federalism has other important goals and consequences, and thus it has been studied from a variety of economic, social, and political perspectives. Surprisingly little research, however, has been done on the effects of federalism in managing territorial cleavages.

In an effort to fill this gap, Nancy Bermeo of Princeton University and Ugo Amoretti of the University of Genoa organized a multiauthor research project under the auspices of Princeton's Center of International Studies. They convened an initial conference in February 2000 that focused on institutional responses to territorial cleavages in six countries in Western Europe and in Canada. A second conference, held in September 2000 with the collaboration of the International Forum for Democratic Studies, addressed the role of federalism in developing and postcommunist countries. Both conferences also included several thematic presentations that took a comparative perspective.

Revised and edited versions of the papers presented at the conference will be published by the Johns Hopkins University Press in 2003 under the title Federalism and Territorial Cleavages. Coedited by Amoretti and Bermeo, the volume opens with an introduction by the former and ends with a concluding essay by the latter. Country chapters cover Switzerland (André Bächtiger and Jürg Steiner); Belgium (Liesbet Hooghe); Canada (Richard Simeon); Spain (Pablo Beramendi and Ramón Maíz Suárez); the United Kingdom (Michael Keating); Italy (Ugo Amoretti); France (Marc Smyrl); Russia (Kathryn Stoner-Weiss); India (Atul Kohli); Turkey (Michele Penner Angrist); Mexico (Guillermo Trejo); and Nigeria (Rotimi Suberu). In addition, there are comparative chapters by R. Kent Weaver, Ferran Requejo, Alfred Stepan, and Valerie Bunce.

In the pages that follow, we present three essays adapted from lengthier chapters that will appear in the book. Nancy Bermeo summarizes some of the study's principal conclusions; R. Kent Weaver explores the impact of different electoral systems on the governability of federations; and Ugo Amoretti recounts Italy's recent moves toward federalism. We are confident that these essays, along with the broader study from which they are drawn, will make a significant contribution to the revival of both scholarly and practical interest in federalism.

--The Editors

 



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