Samenvatting

Paradiplomacy is a recent phenomenon in the field of international relations that entails the decentralization of political power, causing subnational governments to develop international relation. This development is most notable in federal states, since federalization allows for certain autonomy and legislative competences of the federated units. However, this same development has recently also become apparent in unitary states, where subnational governments generally do not enjoy these competences.

As a result, the central question as to how paradiplomacy emerges in federal and unitary states and what distinctions can be made of the emergence of paradiplomacy between these different governmental structures is raised. The objective of this dissertation is therefore to provide a better understanding of the emergence of paradiplomacy in federal and unitary states. In order to find explanations, a qualitative approach was applied, providing an explanatory framework, two descriptive case studies and a comparative method.

The descriptive case studies were conducted on the federal state of Germany and the unitary state of France. The explanatory framework was used to formalize the data from the descriptive case studies to consequently apply the comparative method to, namely the Most Similar Systems Design. This comparative method identified the distinctions, which were further analyzed and concluded.
The results of this dissertation conclude that federal states are more prone to lose control over paradiplomatic development, causing unequal foreign representation of the federated units. In contrast, this development is more uniform in unitary states because of the central government’s ability to control and monitor subnational foreign action. It is noted that decentralization in unitary states is vital to bring about paradiplomatic development, as some competences need to be delegated from the national to the subnational level. Furthermore, the attitude of national and regional politics towards paradiplomacy may further influence the extent to which a subnational government can act internationally. Regional politics especially plays a role in federal states, as it directly affects the paradiplomatic activity of the designated region.

Nonetheless, the development of paradiplomacy in federal and unitary seems to be similar in that the provision of federalization or decentralization, institutionalization of paradiplomatic opportunities and relevant legislation is required. This dissertation therefore demonstrates that the development of paradiplomacy is quite similar in federal and unitary states, but the implications it has are different according to the competences of a region to engage in international activity. The main limitation of the data is, however, that every state undergoes a unique road to paradiplomacy.
The assertions of this dissertation therefore provide a better understanding and a general assumption of the emergence of paradiplomacy in federal and unitary states but cannot provide a total accurate assumption for other states.

LinkedIn author: https://www.linkedin.com/in/aswin-stuivenberg-422573150/