ABSTRACT
This conclusion presents some closing thoughts on concepts covered in the preceding chapters of this book. The book illustrates a perspective on the discussions of defunct federalisms in this volume. The insistence is that such parallel examination of defunct federalisms has a bearing on the interpretation of federal designs and trajectories. The study of defunct federalisms cuts across the controversies surrounding alterations in the organizational forms, processes, and content of states under the pressures of globalization, emerging forms of regional governance, and the reanimation of the conflict propensity of the link between territory and national identity. Federalisms become defunct as a result of the interaction between multiple details and changing contingencies. The study of defunct federalisms helps to reevaluate the processes that failed many a federal dream. It has to be reiterated that each contributor to this volume rejects a simple causal path between the dominant and context-specific factors for failure and the actual collapse of federations.
