Federalism : Devolution Of True Levels Of Sovereignty, Power

Ambar Mainali

No nation can remain iso-lated from adopting a system of governance that ensures transparency, social justice and devolution of power. Nepal, too, is seriously skimming the options of what best form of governance would be appropriate to address the imbalances of development and inclusiveness. The debate on moving ahead for a federal system has gathered momentum among the political parties and the citizenry at large.

People's participation

History reveals that Nepal has been making steady progress in bracing ahead for a governance system, which would allow maximum people's participation in the overall state machinery. The journey from the Rana oligarchy to the eight-party coalition has come through years of debate and struggle. The nation at the moment is deeply engrossed in what model of federalism would augur well for its democratic development.

Except for the educated political elite, not many really understand what federalism stands for, its philosophies and modalities. The concept of federalism revolves around the sharing of power between the central government and the constituent federal states. The different disgruntled groups must be very clear about the fact that power sharing with the centre is not equal.The centre normally has comparatively more power than the constituent states in such a set up. The whole idea is not to confine the powers at the centre but to distribute them to the states. This is agreed upon by the states at the time of promulgating the Constitution and the successive years whenever amendments are proposed to what extent power should be devolved to the states.Today, around 45-50 per cent of the world's population lives in federal states. The essence of federalism is to devolve the true level of power and true level of sovereignty. How should the country be structured at the sub-national level? What electoral system will be used to elect national officials? These are some of the pertinent issues that need to be dealt with.Besides, intergovernmental organs must be developed over a course of time, which are not necessarily provisioned in the Constitution. Infrastructure development, media, roads, bridges and the metric system need to be uniform for all the states.As stated earlier, Nepal has had a chequered political history revealing the gradual devolution of state powers to the people. The eastern part of the country is comparatively more developed than the western part. The same holds true for the eastern hills and western hills. The dalits, Madhesis, ethnic and indigenous populations have grudges that they have been sidelined from the political mainstream. Against this backdrop, devolving state power to the federal units would be a sensible way to allow people to have their say in carving their own fates.

Hence, rumours that the state would disintegrate if it were transformed politically in favour of a federal set up is misleading and unrealistic. Power sharing between the centre and the federal units would instead help keep the unity of the people together. The constitution in the making should take note of the fact that the federal states would have a larger stake in linking their identity with the country instead of breaking away from it. Given this assurance, no federal unit would ever want to break away, as doing so would entail huge expenses for them. They would have to have their own army, police and the administrative set-up.With the agreement among the eight parties that Nepal would move for a federal structure already in place, the only issue in need of a thorough soul searching is 'would the nation be comfortable when the federal units are marked on the basis of ethnicity?' Rather efforts to divide the federal states on the basis of geography would be more sensible in the case of Nepal where communal feeling is very intense. This would, in turn, provide opportunities for the people from diverse groups to intermingle with each other and thereby have a feeling of cultural solidarity.Federalism at the moment is being portrayed like a magic wand that could find instant remedy to all social ills. This, however, is not the reality. There are a range of issues that have to be looked into before laying down the federal structure, which is principally based on the unequal division of the state power.

Following the drafting of the constitution by the constituent assembly to be elected on November 22, it is essential to have a rigorous discourse on which powers to retain at the centre and which to relegate to the sub-national or state level.Besides, the political parties must also work out which model of federalism best suits the nation's development realities. The nation's division on the basis of ethnicity and race is believed to be a model that would only serve to bring about division along racial lines, hence it would be wiser to adopt the geographical demarcation while carving out the states.The benefits of federalism are such that it reduces abuse of power and tyranny. Decentralised authority lessens the risk of autocratic rule because disbursed power is harder to consolidate and exploit. It helps to solve basic collective action problems. It helps reconcile the need for both unity and diversity. It allows for ethnic, cultural, demographic, economic differences to flourish sub-nationally and be incorporated nationally. A federal system permits greater flexibility and responsibility. Each sub-national government can tailor policies to the citizenry, and the citizens can hold their sub-national as well national officials to account.Last but not the least, federalism encourages innovation, competition and efficiency. Sub-national governments are policy laboratories that innovate and learn from each other, and in mobile societies competition among governments may yield better policies.

Risks

However, there are risks in federalism. It creates collective action problems. Public bads may proliferate, such as cross-jurisdictional pollution. There could be accountability problems in a federal system owing to multiple elected officials. Next, local biases cannot be ruled out. Sub-national politicians will tend to favour the interests of their own constituents, which can come at the expense of national interest. And finally, the issue of inequality could surface as some sub-national units will have greater demands and problems than others, creating either inequities or animosities arising from redistribution by the national government of sub-national resources.

Source: The Rising Nepal, August 4, 2007