Federal republic

The Federal Republic of Germany and its sixteen Bundesländer (federal states), since 1990

A federal republic is a federation of states with a republican form of government. A federation is the central government. The states in a federation also maintain the federation. Usage of the term republic is inconsistent but, as a minimum, it means a state or federation of states that does not have a monarchy.

In a federal republic, there is a division of powers between the national "federal" government, and the government of the individual subdivisions. While every nation manages this division of powers differently, national security and defense, monetary policy, and other issues of a "national" scope are handled at the "federal" level while more local issues such as road and infrastructure maintainance and education policy are handled at the local level. In other words, while the federal government has ultimate sovereignty, there is a limited sovereignty granted to the subdivisions, where the federal government does not have jurisdiction. This is in contrast to a unitary republic whereby the national government has complete soverignty over all aspects of political life, and subdivisions are purely administrative in nature.

In English, before the merger of the two German states in 1990, the phrase "Federal Republic" was often used to refer to West Germany (within its pre-1990 borders), in contrast with the German Democratic Republic, otherwise called East Germany.

List of federal republics

Contemporary

Historic

• Republic of the Seven United Netherlands (1581–1795)
• "Great Colombia" (1819-1831), later Colombia (federal republic until 1886; unitary republic after 1886)
• Paraguay (1813-1876)
• Weimar Republic (Germany 1919-1933)
• Union of Burma (1948-1962)
• Federal Republic of Cameroon (République Fédérale du Cameroun) (1961-1972)
• Uganda (1962-1966)
• Czechoslovakia (1969-1992)
• Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (1922-1991)
• Yugoslavia (1945-2003)

See also

• Form of government