role of state in plural and unequal society
Plural society During research about plural societies, Asim Ejaz, Student of M.phil Political Science in Islamia university bahawalpur, Pakistan, presented his analytical summary about the book of Arend Lijphart, "democracy in plural societies" that it is so much difficult to achieve and stable democratic government in plural society. As Aristotle says about stable governing system that, “a state aims at being, as far as it can be, a society composed of equal & peers”. For the stability of democratic regimes, there must be social homogeneity and political consensus among the deep social divisions, and, there must be termination of political differences. There are these criteria, because, the factors that help in producing instability and breakdown of democracies. Arend Lijphart, therefore, used a particular form of democracy, “Consociational Democracy”, which is, according to him, may be difficult but it is not at all impossible to achieve and maintain stable democratic government in plural societies.
Nullification (U.S. Constitution) The theory of nullification is based on a view that the States formed the Union by an agreement (or "compact") among the States, and that as creators of the federal government, the States have the final authority to determine the limits of the power of that government. Under this, the compact theory, the States and not the federal courts are the ultimate interpreters of the extent of the federal government's power. Under this theory, the States therefore may reject, or nullify, federal laws that the States believe are beyond the federal government's constitutional powers. The related idea of interposition is a theory that a state has the right and the duty to "interpose" itself when the federal government enacts laws that the state believes to be unconstitutional. Thomas Jefferson and James Madison set forth the theories of nullification and interposition in the Kentucky and Virginia Resolutions in 1798.