9
and education). The theory behind territorial autonomy makes the assumption that policy-
making in fields that involve a clear cultural dimension presents great potential for
conflict in situations of multi-ethnicity or multinationalism. For example, one group
might want to promote a language regime favouring its own tongue or an education
curriculum presenting its own vision of the state or national history. Of course, federated
units or autonomous territories are not often completely homogenous and units/territories
where the state-wide minority group is dominant often needs to coexist with communities
from the state-wide majority group.
17
In this context, there is still potential for conflict,
but it can be argue that a federal liberal democratic system offers modes of
accommodation through minority-rights guarantees. There is also the fact that members
of the state-wide majority group who are in a minority position within a federated
unit/autonomous territory retain power and representation at the centre. In this same
logic, we could say that schemes of territorial autonomy are attractive not only because of
the specific policy fields they decentralize but also because they provide minority groups
with political power. Territorial autonomy also produces a new forum for political
representation,
18
through a regional legislature, as well as a distinct political class for the
minority group. These are important references for a group in search of cultural and
political security.
Territorial autonomy as an approach to managing multinationalism represents a
framework for territorial governance that can lead to many different actualizations. For
17
Henry Hale has recently argued that federations are more likely to collapse when they contain a
core ethnic region. See “Divided We Stand. Institutional Sources of Ethnofederal State Survival
and Collapse,” World Politics, 56 (2004), 165-193.
18
Federalism also often involves a house for the constituent units at the center as is the case for
the United States and Germany. In this context, approaches of empowerment at the center and
territorial autonomy are entirely compatible.
Convention