Federation and empire: About a conceptual distinction of political forms

This article seeks to demonstrate that the modern nation state is by no means an unrivaled polity type, nor one that even supplies the template for other polity types. Rather the sovereign state, with its distinctively unitarian legal form has developed alongside and in complex interaction with federation and empire—two polity types that for all their differences share a more pluralistic internal logic. Both are unions of states, of very different nature. Federations are based on the consent of states whereas empires are grounded on force and conquest, where the center dominates the dependencies or peripheries. Paradoxically, an empire allows more diversity inside its sphere of domination whereas a federation requires more homogeneity between its member states. This rather theoretical pattern is able, nevertheless, to enlighten some contemporary discussions, especially on the European Union.