Political Identity and Tragic Compromise
Publication Year: 2008
Published by: University of Michigan Press
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In a previous book, we explored the role of the federal courts in reforming conditions in American prisons. One of our findings was that principles of federalism did not deter the courts from revamping state prison systems.The federal courts simply ignored the weight of history—the Thirteenth Amendment, the century-old “hands-off” doctrine, the lack of precedent—...
Introduction: Why We Need a Theory of Federalism
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In the mid-nineteenth century, two-thirds of the world’s landmass was governed by imperial edict. In the early twenty-first century, according to many political theorists, this same proportion of the world is governed by federal arrangement. Indeed, some theorists claim that the proportion could be much higher. Writing in 1994, the late Daniel Elazar ...
Chapter 1. What is Federalism?
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In order to discuss federalism (at a theoretical level at least), it is necessary to define it. This immediately raises a number of the complexities that beset this subject and that mechanistic discussions of it tend to ignore or obscure. In fact, the problem is sufficiently complex that no mere definition will suffice. However clear one tries to be about such an ...
Chapter 2. Why Federalism? The Tragic Aspect of Politics
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It is one thing to define or demarcate a political concept; it is another thing to describe its purpose. Labels can be attached to all sorts of political arrangement. One could have a term for a regime with a ruling military junta, a bicameral legislature, and a constitutional court, for example, but the ...
Chapter 3. Federalism in Political Science
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The previous two chapters presented, in generalized terms, a theoretical approach to federalism. We began by defining the concept of federalism as a grant of partial autonomy to geographical subunits of a nation and by distinguishing it from closely associated, but basically different, institutional arrangements, such as consociation, decentralization, and democracy. We then proceeded ...
Chapter 4. Federalism in America
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The United States has always considered itself a federal nation, and other nations generally regard it as such. But this characterization, often derived from governmental structures that are actually consociative, decentralized, or merely democratic, has been plagued by the ambiguity that attends the entire subject of federalism. The nature and ...
Chapter 5. The Judicial Doctrine of Federalism
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As stated at the outset, this book is about the theory of federalism, not about the legal doctrine of federalism that American constitutional courts have developed. Its goal is to approach federalism as a principle of political organization, without becoming immersed in the infinite complexities of the judicial decisions that have attracted so much ...
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Now that we have reached the end of our discussion, it seems appropriate to review the ground we have covered. Our aim in this book is to provide a theoretical approach to federalism, a general account of this specific mode of organizing the government of a political entity. Such an account necessarily begins with a definition, as there is very little ...
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Page Count: 238
Publication Year: 2008