Seminar Syllabus
Zoltan Bécsi, PhD
Professor at the Geneva School of Diplomacy and International Relations
and
Research Fellow
European Institute of the University of Geneva
(now Global Studies Institute)
zbecsi@yahoo.com
“Sovereignty versus Empire” and “Nation State versus European Federalism”:
Can we escape these opposites?
Key notions to be studied: Sovereignty, Nation, State, Empire, Federalism (Confederation,
Federation).
This multidisciplinary (History of thought, Political Science) seminar intends to explore the roots of
the very topical debate in the EU on sovereignty versus federalism, including European federalism.
First, we will study the creation of modern sovereignty in the 16th century by Jean Bodin and the
opposition between the Sovereign State of France and the Holy Roman Empire, a proto-federalist
structure as well as other political thinkers and their ideas on nation, state, sovereignty and federalism.
Then, we will look at the development of Confederations –changed into Federal States (Germany,
Switzerland) – and Unitary States, and discover the way they have defined or redefined themselves
since the 19th century by examining the two forms of unitary state in the effort to forge a nation:
Staatsnation and Kulturnation. Parallel to the multiplication of States –that has truly intensified since
the fall of the Iron Curtain (Yugoslav War, separation of Czechoslovakia…) the EU has been uniting
European nations into a new kind of structure that can neither be described as a Confederation nor as a
Federation.
We will conclude the seminar by seeing whether there is a third way between the EU –and its present
corollary of a political (federal) Europe and Sovereign States. In this aim we will also have to look at
the political thought behind both ideas: the conservative idea of the nation (represented in Britain by
the thinking of Roger Scruton who has a strong influence on British and Hungarian conservative
thought today) and the left wing idea of European federalism represented by Altiero Spinelli and the
Spinelli Group (members such as Guy Verhofstadt and Daniel Cohn-Bendit).
1. Method: Lecture, seminar (presentations), group discussion.
2. Preparation for the Seminar:
Each student has to choose a subject that he/her will present to the class with the support of
PowerPoint. Each student will also prepare and present a significant text (source) from the
authors studied in the subject. We will have a group discussion on the presentation and text
afterwards. The chosen text has to be a source (a document or a passage from the political
thinker presented by the student length: 2-3 pages)
Duration of presentation: 40-45 min and text presentation 20-30 min.
The text chosen and a bibliography comprising the books, articles and websites (Wikipedia
forbidden) used for the preparation of the power point presentation.
These two documents have to be sent to me and all students two weeks (31 March) before the
beginning of the seminar. My address: zbecsi@yahoo.com
All students should read the compulsory texts which will be discussed together during the week.
The aim of this exercise is for students to study sources and compare them
2.1. Subjects:
a) Jean Bodin, the sovereignist (Six Books of the Republic) and Althusius, the federalist (Politica
methodica digesta)
Study the difference between the two concepts of sovereignty.
Althusius: http://files.libertyfund.org/files/692/Althusius_0002_EBk_v6.0.pdf
Bodin: http://www.arts.yorku.ca/politics/comninel/courses/3020pdf/six_books.pdf
b) Ludloph Hugo (1630-1704) (De Statu Regionum Germanie) and Montesquieu (Spirit of Laws)
Study the notions of State and Federalism in their writings.
Many quotations of the original text of Hugo in Riley, Patrick, The origins of the federal theory in
international relations theory, Polity, Vol. 6, no. 1 (Autumn), pp. 97-121.
c) Pfichte and Johann Gottfried von Herder
Study their idea of Nation in their works
Pfichte source: https://archive.org/details/johanngottlieb00fichuoft
d) The Austro-Marxists and Federalism: Karl Renner and Otto Bauer on deterritorialised
federalism. How did they want to reorganise the Habsburg Monarchy and their influence today
e) Coudenhove-Kalergi (Paneuropa) and Altiero Spinelli (European federalist Movement).
Compare “Paneuropa” and Spinelli’s conceptions.
Sources:
Coudenhove, Manifesto: “Paneuropa”, 1923.
Richard Nicolaus Coudenhove-Kalergi (Graf von), Pan-Europe, A. A. Knopf, 1926.
and/or
Coudenhove, « Europe must unite », 1938:
http://www.cvce.eu/obj/richard_coudenhove_kalergi_l_europe_unie_1938-fr-87035567-586c-4a1299e7-6857ee13f146.html
Spinelli : Ventotene Manifesto, 1941.
http://www.altierospinelli.org/manifesto/en/manifestoen_en.html
f) Kant and Rousseau on Federalism
Compare their work.
2.2. Programme
Day 1: Analysing definitions, Study of 16th and 17th century ideas on state, Empire and federalism,
Westphalia.
Presentations: Bodin-Althusius.
Compulsory readings for all:
Osiander, Andreas, ‘Sovereignty, International Relations and the Westphalian Myth’ in International
Organization, no. 55, 2, Spring 2001.
http://iclass.iuea.ac.ug/intranet/Ebooks/PUBLIC%20ADMINISTRATION/PUBLIC%20ADMINISTRATION/Sovereignty,%20Interna
tional%20Relations,%20and%20the%20Westphalian%20Myth,.pdf
or
http://graduateinstitute.ch/files/live/sites/iheid/files/sites/political_science/shared/political_science/_pr
evious/2011_Spring_Semester/Sovereignty,_Intervention,_and_Humanitarianism/Andreas%20Osiand
er.pdf
Day 2: 17th -18th centuries and 19th century:
-the creation of nations: Kulturnation and Staatsnation (Herder, Pfichte, Renan)
Presentations: Herder and Pfichte, Hugo and Montesquieu or Kant and Rousseau.
Compulsory readings for all:
Renan, Ernest, What is a nation?, 1882.
http://www.nationalismproject.org/what/renan.htm
Day 4: The federal Empires: The German Reich and Austria-Hungary and Coudenhove’s “PanEuropa”.
Presentation: Renner- Bauer
Compulsory readings for all:
Majocchi, L.V., ‘Nationalism and Federalism in 19th Century Europe’ in The Federal Idea, vol. I,
Lothian Found. Press, London, NY, 1991.
WAGNER, Francis S., ‘Nationalism versus Federalism in Historical Perspective’ in Wagner…, in
Wagner, Francis S, Towards a New Central Europe, A Symposium on the Problems of the Danubian
Nations, Astor Park, Florida, Danubian Press, 1970.
http://www.hungarian-history.hu/lib/thenew.htm
Day 5: Nation-State and Federalism. Conclusion
Presentation: Coudenhove and Spinelli.
Compulsory readings for all:
Pistone, Sergio, ‘Altiero Spinelli and the Strategy for the United States of Europe’ in Bosco, Andrea,
in The Federal Idea, vol. I…(see bibliography under)
Scruton, Roger, England and the Need for Nations, 2004.
http://www.civitas.org.uk/pdf/EnglandAndTheNeedForNations.pdf
Websites to check:
http://www.spinelligroup.eu/
http://federalistparty.eu/
http://www.paneuropa.org
3. Indicative literature (in English, French, German) on presentation subjects (in bold letters:
important books and articles in English)
Aretin (von), Karl Otmar, ‘The Old Reich: A Federation of Hierarchical System?’ in The Holy Roman
Empire 1495-1806 (ed. Evans, R.J.W., Schaich, Michael, Wilson, Peter H.), The German Historical
Institute London, Oxford University Press, 2011.
Beaud, Olivier, ‘La fédération entre l’Etat et l’Empire’ in Théret , Bruno (dir.) L’Etat, la finance et le
social, la Découverte, Paris , 1995.
Beaud, Olivier, ‘Peut-on penser l’Union européenne comme une fédération’ in Europe : de
l’Intégration à la fédération (ed. Esposito, Frédéric, Levrat, Nicolas), Academia Bruylant - Université
de Genève, Louvain-La-Neuve, 2010
Bosco, Andrea, the Federal Idea, V I and II,… (many articles on federalism) (see above)
Chabot, Jean-Luc, Aux origines intellectuelles de l’Union européenne, L’idée d’Europe unie de 1919 à
1939, Presses Universitaires de Grenoble, Grenoble, 2005.
Demelemestre, Gaëlle: Les deux souverainetés et leur destin, le tournant Bodin-Althusius, Eds du
Cerf, Paris, 2011.
Eulau, Heinz H.F., ‘Theories of Federalism under the Holy Roma Empire’, American Political
Science Review, Vol. 35, no 4, 1941. pp. 643-64.
Stollberg-Rilinger, B., Das Heilige Römische Reich Deutscher Nation, Von Ende des Mittelalters bis
1806, C.H. Beck, 2006
Levrat, Nicolas, « L’intégration européenne à la lumière de la subsidiarité. Ou pourquoi l’Union
européenne ne devient pas les Etats-Unis d’Europe. » in Europe : de l’intégration…,
Levi Lucio, Altiero Spinelli, Mario Albertini and the Italian Federalist School: Federalism as Ideology
in The Federal Idea, vol. II, Lothian Found. Press, London, NY, 1991
Pierré-Caps, Stéphane, La Multination, Odile Jacobs Ed., Paris, 1995
Riley, Patrick, The origins of the federal theory in international relations theory, Polity, Vol. 6,
no. 1 (Autumn), pp. 97-121, (Autumn), 1973.
Saint-Gilles, Anne-Marie, La “Paneurope” Un débat d’idées dans l’Entre-deux-guerres, Presses de
l’Université de Paris-Sorbonne, Paris, 2003, 280-5.
Seton-Watson, Hugh, Nations and States, Westview Press, Boulder, Colorado, 1977.
Ward, Ann and Lee, The Ashgate Research Companion to Federalism, Ashgate, Farnham, 2009.
Wilson, Peter, H., The Holy Roman Empire 1495-1806, Macmillan Press, London, 1999.