What Belgium Can Teach Bosnia: The Uses of Autonomy in 'Divided House' States

Belgium and Bosnia can be understood as “divided house” states, which contain proportionally similar groups with opposing views regarding whether the state should be more unitary or more decentralised. The Belgian example demonstrates that even where groups disagree on state structure, a mixture of various forms of group autonomy may facilitate stability and compromise within the state. Belgium addresses this dilemma in two ways: 1) non-territorial autonomous units in the form of the linguistic communities, and 2) exclusive competencies for different units within the diverse Belgian state. In... Mehr ...