Federalism and Colonialism: History, Practice, and Lessons from Federation of Rhodesia and Nyasaland

The short-lived Central African Federation, created by British colonialists in 1952, represents one of the most failed federal experiments of the post-war era. In forming this entity, the British violated almost all the textbook principles of creating federal states. But the most important defect of the Federation of Rhodesia and Nyasaland was that instead of building a system that harmonized the relations of the white minority and provided it with guarantees of self-determination in an overwhelmingly non-white environment, this federation was designed to perpetuate a pattern of racial domination of this minority. This congenital injury rendered the Central African Federation unviable and doomed to destruction in 1963, making its life cycle very short. Nevertheless, its brief appearance on the world map was that it significantly discredited federalism in the eyes of the political elites of post-colonial states.