Israeli Presence at the International Federalism Days in Munich

Federalism is closely connected with values of political participation in democracies. Federalism is a tool to deal with territorial and cultural pluralism. Managing conflicts and regulating cooperation are therefore the backbone of federalism and alike tools such as decentralization. When the idea of federalism was first born, it was a philosophical approach to political organization, serving essentially economic and military purposes. In legal terms, the early idea of federalism was closer to international rather than constitutional law, aiming at bringing together sovereign units that alone were no longer competitive. This has been the case for historic federations, notably, the US, Switzerland, Germany, Canada and Australia.

Hanns Seidel Foundation arranges for international meetings on federalism since 2013. A look at the participants’ list of the International Federalism Days 2017 reveals two things. Firstly, each state the participants’ originate from has to stand up against the same critical test: the effective management of conflicts resulting from the accommodation of various kinds of diversities. Secondly, in many states the participants come from, federal or federal-type arrangements are discussed or have been introduced as peace-making and state-building devices, aiming either to keep the state intact or to settle conflicts by accommodating minority groups in an inclusive system of government. Whether or not federalism and decentralization lead to the successful resolution of a conflict depends on various variables which cannot be other than context bound (intergovernmental relations, distribution of competences and the accommodation of minorities, the role of the judiciary, fiscal arrangements and financial relations).

Since Israel has highly centralized governance, it may seem odd to include academics and civil society from Israel into the discussion. But, as Professor Menachem Mautner, the Danielle Rubinstein Professor of Comparative Civil Law and Jurisprudence at the Tel Aviv University, pointed out, local governance provides the municipal level in Israel with a wide range of competences. Most visibly, the municipalities can chose from five different educational systems and decide about the kind and character of cultural activities conducted in their municipality. But also the licensing of business, the choice of street names, the language of advertisements and even the weekly day of rest falls under the decision of the municipality.

Whether an increase of competencies on the local level may help harmonize majority-minority relations in Israel will be studied, among other things, by our partner the Citizen Accord Forum on its international workshop in December 2017.