Chapter – 1

Power-sharing

In this post we have given the detailed notes of class 10 Social Science (Political Science) Chapter 1 Power-sharing in English. These notes are useful for the students who are going to appear in class 10 board exams.

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Chapter 1: Power-sharing

Introduction

Belgium and Sri Lanka are two neighbouring countries that are very small in size compared to India, but the ways in which they have dealt with the question of power sharing among different social groups are very different. Belgium has managed to accommodate the regional and cultural diversities of its population by sharing power, while Sri Lanka’s failure to do so has produced years of civil war and suffering. These two examples raise a common set of questions for democracy: how should power be shared so that a country runs successfully and to the satisfaction of different groups?

Case Study 1: Belgium

Ethnic Composition of Belgium

• Belgium is a small country in Europe, with an area of about 30,500 square kilometres and a population of about one crore (10 million), roughly equal to the population of Haryana.
• Dutch-speaking region: 59% of the people live in the Flemish region and speak Dutch.
• French-speaking region: 40% of the people live in the Wallonia region and speak French.
• German-speaking minority: The remaining 1% speak German.
• In the capital Brussels, 80% of the people speak French while 20% are Dutch-speaking.
• The minority French-speaking community was relatively rich and powerful, which was resented by the Dutch-speaking community, who got the benefit of education and economic development much later. This led to tensions between the two communities during the 1950s and 1960s, especially in Brussels.

Accommodation through Constitutional Reforms (1970–1993)

The Belgian leaders recognised the differences and conflicts between the two major communities and accepted the existence of regional differences and cultural diversities. Between 1970 and 1993, they amended their constitution four times so as to work out an arrangement that would enable everyone to live together within the same country. The arrangement they worked out is a good example of a power-sharing arrangement to meet the multiple and complex requirements of Belgium.

The Belgian Constitution provides for a unique and innovative institutional mechanism, with the following elements:

1. The number of Dutch- and French-speaking ministers is equal in the Central Government. Some special laws require the support of a majority of members from each linguistic group. As a result, no single community can make decisions unilaterally.
2. Many powers of the Central Government have been given to the State Governments of the two regions of the country. The Central Government is not responsible for matters like education, culture, language, etc. that concern only one of the communities.
3. Brussels has a separate government in which both communities have equal representation. The French-speaking people accepted equal representation with the Dutch-speaking people in the Brussels regional government, because the Dutch-speaking people had accepted equal representation in the Central Government.
4. Belgium also has a third kind of government, called the “community government”, which is elected by people belonging to one language community — Dutch, French, and German-speaking — no matter where they live. This government has the power regarding cultural, educational, and language-related issues.

Outcome: This complex system of power sharing has helped Belgium avoid civic strife between the two major communities, and a violent breakup of the country that many had predicted in the 1950s did not take place.

Case Study 2: Sri Lanka

Population Composition of Sri Lanka

• Sri Lanka is an island nation, smaller than Belgium, located just a few miles off the southern coast of Tamil Nadu, with a population of about two crore (2 crore) people.
• Sinhala speakers: 74% of the population, mostly Buddhist.
• Tamil speakers: 18% of the population, divided into two sub-groups — Sri Lankan Tamils (13%), whose ancestors lived in Sri Lanka since ancient times, and Indian Tamils (5%), whose ancestors were brought to Sri Lanka as plantation workers by the British colonialists from India.
• Most Sri Lankan Tamils are Hindu or Christian by religion, while most Sinhala people are Buddhist.

Majoritarianism after Independence (1948)

Majoritarianism is a belief that the majority community should be able to rule a country in whichever way it wants, by disregarding the wishes and needs of the minority. Sri Lanka emerged as an independent country in 1948. The leaders of the Sinhala community wanted to secure dominance over government jobs, business, and other opportunities by taking advantage of their numerical majority, and pursued this policy for the following reasons.

Various steps were taken by the Sri Lankan government to establish Sinhala supremacy:

1. In 1956, an act was passed to recognise Sinhala as the only official language, disregarding Tamil.
2. The governments followed preferential policies that favoured Sinhala applicants for university positions and government jobs.
3. A new constitution stipulated that the state shall protect and foster Buddhism, giving it foremost place.

Alienation of the Tamil Community

All these government measures, coming one after the other, gradually increased the feeling of alienation among the Sri Lankan Tamils. They felt that none of the major political parties led by the Buddhist Sinhala leaders was sensitive to their language and culture. They felt that the constitution and government policies denied them equal political rights, discriminated against them in getting jobs and other opportunities, and ignored their interests. As a result, the relations between the Sinhala and Tamil communities strained over time.

Civil War and Demand for Tamil Eelam

The Sri Lankan Tamils launched parties and struggles for the recognition of Tamil as an official language, for regional autonomy, and equality of opportunity in securing education and jobs. But their demands were repeatedly denied. By the 1980s, several political organisations were formed demanding an independent Tamil Eelam (or Tamil state) in northern and eastern parts of Sri Lanka. The distrust between the two communities gradually turned into a widespread conflict, which soon turned into a civil war. This civil war caused a terrible setback to the social, cultural, and economic life of the country, thousands of people of both communities lost their lives, many families were forced to leave the country as refugees, and normal life was severely affected.

Comparing the Two Cases

The Belgian model of power sharing is very different from that of Sri Lanka. Both these models emerged out of respective historical contexts and processes. It is not that whatever the Belgians did is a good idea and Sri Lanka should have followed that. But the Belgian model gives us a good example of power sharing that accommodated regional and cultural diversities, and thereby national unity was strengthened and the possibility of a violent conflict was reduced. Sri Lanka shows us a contrasting example — a country that could have avoided its ethnic conflict if it had followed a more accommodative approach towards its minority community.

Why Power Sharing is Desirable?

There are two different, but interconnected, reasons why power sharing is good for democracies. They can broadly be put into two categories — prudential and moral.

1. Prudential Reasons

Prudential means based on prudence, i.e., based on careful calculation of gains and losses of a decision.

• Power sharing helps to reduce the possibility of conflict between social groups. Since social conflict often leads to violence and political instability, power sharing is a good way to ensure the stability of political order.
• Imposition of the will of the majority community over others may look attractive in the short run, but in the long run it undermines the unity of the nation.
• Attempts to impose the wishes of the majority community over others usually cause deep discontent among the minority. Trying to suppress all such demands in the name of national unity often results in the exact opposite — it produces disunity and disintegration of the country.
• Prudence suggests that it is wiser to respect the wishes of those who live in a different region or belong to a different ethnic group from the rest, so that democracy remains stable and does not slide into the tyranny of the majority.

2. Moral Reasons

Power sharing is valuable in itself, quite apart from the calculation of its benefits.

• The very act of sharing power reduces the chances of tyranny by any one group, and reflects a spirit of accommodation and mutual respect among different groups.
• The essence of democracy is that people have a right to be consulted in the exercise of power that is used over them. A legitimate government is one where citizens, through participation, acquire a stake in the system.
• People and communities have democratic rights and expect to be consulted, or want to have a say, in the decisions that affect them. This is the spirit of democracy — power sharing is the very basis of any democratic government.

Note: The prudential and the moral reasons for power sharing are interlinked with one another. Power sharing arrangements can be judged in terms of both these reasons.

Forms of Power Sharing

In modern democracies, power sharing arrangements can take many forms. Democracy is essentially about a rule based on the norm of power sharing. There are four such major forms of power sharing.

1. Horizontal Distribution of Power

• In a democracy, power is shared among different organs of government, such as the legislature, executive, and judiciary. This is a horizontal distribution of power because it allows different organs of government, placed at the same level, to exercise different powers.
• This arrangement is also called a system of checks and balances, because it ensures that none of the organs can exercise unlimited power. Each organ checks the others; this results in a balance of power among various institutions.
• Such a division also allows different institutions to control each other’s power, and thereby ensures that power is not concentrated in one place.

2. Vertical (or Territorial) Distribution of Power

• Power can be shared among governments at different levels — a general (or federal/central) government for the entire country, and governments at the provincial or regional level.
• Such a form of power sharing is called federal division of power. It involves sharing of power between the Central Government and various constituent units of the country, e.g., Central, State, and Local (Panchayat/Municipality) governments in India.
• In this arrangement, the same source of power (i.e., the constitution) gives power to Central as well as State Governments, and each tier of government exercises its power in its own jurisdiction, independent of the other level.
• Sometimes, power sharing involves multiple divisions of power below the state level too, as in the case of Belgium’s community government.

3. Power Sharing among Different Social Groups

• Power can be shared among different social groups, such as the religious and linguistic groups. This kind of arrangement is meant to give minority communities a fair share in power.
• Such arrangements are meant to give minority communities a fair share in political power. This method is used to give social justice to disadvantaged communities like the SCs and STs in India.
• Institutional mechanisms such as the “community government” in Belgium are examples of this. Another example is reserving a certain percentage of seats in a legislature, or in government jobs, for a section of the population.

4. Power Sharing among Political Parties, Pressure Groups, and Movements

• Power sharing arrangements can also be seen in the way political parties, pressure groups, and movements control or influence those exercising power.
• In a democracy, citizens must have freedom to choose among various contenders for power. This takes the form of competition among different parties.
• Such competition ensures that power does not remain in one hand; in the long run, power is shared among different political parties that represent different ideologies and social groups.
• Sometimes, power is shared among political parties, directly or indirectly, in the form of coalition governments, where several parties come together to run the government.
• Different pressure groups, such as those of traders, businesses, industrialists, farmers, or workers, also play a significant role in the exercise of governmental power, either through direct participation or by influencing those who exercise this power.

Key Terms to Remember

• Power sharing: The distribution of power among different organs or levels of government or between different social groups so as to reduce conflict and ensure stability.
• Majoritarianism: A belief that the majority community should be able to rule a country in whichever way it wants, by disregarding the wishes and needs of the minority.
• Prudential: Based on prudence, that is, based on careful calculation of gains and losses.
• Tyranny: Any severe form of domination, in this context a majority ruling in disregard of minority wishes and interests.
• Coalition Government: A government formed by several political parties joining together, usually because no single party has won a clear majority on its own.

Key Points to Remember

• Belgium accommodated regional and linguistic diversity through constitutional amendments (1970–1993) that created a federal system with community government and equal Brussels representation.
• Sri Lanka’s 1956 “Sinhala only” policy and other majoritarian measures alienated the Tamil minority, leading to civil war and the demand for a separate Tamil Eelam.
• Power sharing is desirable for both prudential reasons (reduces conflict, ensures stability, avoids tyranny of the majority) and moral reasons (it is the very spirit of democracy).
• Horizontal power sharing occurs among the legislature, executive, and judiciary, through checks and balances.
• Vertical power sharing occurs among the Central, State, and Local governments — the federal division of power.
• Power sharing among social groups is achieved through mechanisms like Belgium’s community government and reserved constituencies/seats.
• Power sharing among political parties, pressure groups, and movements happens through party competition and coalition governments.
• This chapter provides the conceptual foundation for the study of federalism in Chapter 2.

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