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Unitary state, a system of political organization in which most or all of the governing power resides in a centralized government. In a unitary state, the central government commonly delegates authority to subnational units and channels policy decisions down to them for implementation.
- The Editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica
Unitary states, like federal states, can be constitutional democracies or unfree non-democracies. Both the unitary Republic of France and the Federal Republic of Germany, for example, are constitutional democracies, while the unitary states of Algeria, Libya, and Swaziland are unfree non-democracies.
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Depending on how a constitution organizes power between the central and subnational governments, a country may be said to possess either a unitary or a federal system (see also federalism). In a unitary system the only level of government besides the central is the local or municipal government .
The United States is one example of a federal republic. The U.S. Constitution grants specific powers to the national government while retaining other powers for the states. For example, the federal government can negotiate treaties with other countries while state and local authorities cannot.
Figure 3.2 There are three general systems of government—unitary systems, federations, and confederations—each of which allocates power differently. In a confederation, authority is decentralized, and the central government’s ability to act depends on the consent of the subnational governments.
A unitary system of government can be considered to be the opposite of federalism. In federations, the provincial/regional governments share powers with the central government as equal actors through a written constitution , to which the consent of both is required to make amendments.
Italy is perhaps one of the best examples of how a state may closely resemble a unitary system notwithstanding the presence of regional governments. The limited powers constitutionally granted to the regions have been extended by the national legislature through its devolution of additional matters to the purview of regional legislatures.
