Elusive Federalism: Syria

Abstract

A variety of projects for the Syrian federalization began to be put forward from the very beginning of the civil conflict in this country. In particular, the federation for Syria has powerful supporters acting through the Syrian Kurds, for whom this scheme seems to be the best of a bad lot, allowing them to survive politically. But the peculiarity of the Syrian situation is also that the federal idea is actively promoted here, like in Iraq in due times, by external actors. In case of Syria, it is first of all the Russian Federation, which proposed its own model of decentralization of Syria by preparing a draft of the Syrian constitution. At the same time, during the civil war in Syria, a de facto federal entity arose, consisting of the Kurdish cantons. This fact, along with the Idlib province controlled by the opposition, makes it inevitable that it is necessary to resort to various decentralization mechanisms to keep Syria within its present borders, as well as to form a single government that will exercise its power over the entire territory of the country, not only de jure, but also de facto.