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Lastly, it is simply wrong to claim, as Snyder and others do, that ethnofederalism is
unworkable. Two of the worlds’ oldest states, Switzerland and Canada, are
ethnofederations. They have lasted from 1848 and 1867, respectively, and both
demonstrate that the accommodation of ethnic minorities through ethnofederalism is
consistent with prosperity and the promotion of basic individual rights. The world’s
largest democracy, India, is also an ethnofederal state, and the most successful large-scale
post-colonial democracy.
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Belgium, while of more recent vintage, has adopted
successful ethnofederalist structures, while Russia, if Chechenya is left aside, appears to
be on its way towards establishing itself as a democratic ethnofederation. Within each of
these states, there is plenty of evidence, including polling data and the positions of their
political parties, that minorities are content with less than a sovereign state (Keating
2002: 7-9). Together, these qualifications question the assumption that multi-national
federalism is bound to fail. Our next task is to inquire into the conditions that make
success more or less likely.
Explaining success and failure
The five conditions that facilitate but do not guarantee successful multi-national
federations are implicit in the preceding discussion. Here we spell them out.
(i)
The presence of a Staatsvolk.
As Table 8.1 shows, national federations are more stable than multi-national federations.
The latter are more likely to fail or break-up. The reason is straightforward: national
federations are generally nationally homogeneous, or virtually so. However, O’Leary’s
data shows that the relative stability of multi-national federations is also related to the
demographic preponderance of their largest national communities, to whether or not these
constitute Staatsvolk. A Staatsvolk can feel secure – and live with the concessions
attached to multi-national federation, and ceteris paribus, has the demographic strength
and resources to resist secessionism by minority nationalities. Multi-national federations
without a Staatsvolk are more likely to be unstable, face secessionism or break-up,
because minorities are more likely to think they can prevail (O’Leary 2001). Russia’s
future cannot be extrapolated from the experience of the Soviet Union, because Russians
are far more dominant within the former than they were within the latter. The same
argument implies that Nigeria and a future European federation will, ceteris paribus, be
relatively unstable, as neither possesses a Staatsvolk. What must be considered in our
‘ceteris paribus’ clause? We hypothesize as follows:
(a) Multi-national federations without a Staatsvolk, if they are to survive as
democratic entities, must develop consociational practices that protect the interests of all
the encompassed national and ethnic communities with the capacity to breakaway.
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India’s success is explained away by Snyder as a result of the unwillingness of its civic central
authorities to recognise ethnicity (2000: 287-96). This is nonsense. It is odd that a federation, the internal
boundaries of which are constructed along ethno-linguistic lines, can be seen in this way. Where there is
some truth is that Indian governments have formally refused to recognize religiosity as the basis of
provincial boundary and unit formation.
Convention