What is Sovereignty?

Discuss the difference between internal and external

sovereignty?
Sovereignty is an important element of the state. It distinguishes the state from
other political associations within a society. The origin of the concept of sovereignty
is linked with the origin of territorial state in the modern days. Social groups and
associations in the territory of the state can establish their own rules but within the
limits defined by the law of the sovereign state. The concept of sovereignty
primarily lay on the assumption that the state is supreme to citizen. In other words,
sovereignty is a constitutional arrangement of political life.
To trace the history of emergence of sovereignty, one can find that in the classical
Greek city state or the Polis, where earliest political systems emerged there was no
difference between the state and the society. The citizens in these city states were
the subjects of state authority as well as the creators of public rules and regulations.
It was through the Roman Empire that came to Greece that the ruling subject was
brought under a single central authority. Then, the concept of the sovereignty
emerged as a mechanism to enforce a centralized law over the ruling subjects.
During later stages of world history, with the emergence of theocratic states, the
idea of sovereignty was discouraged as the law of nature or religious rules came to
be considered as superior to the laws of the state.
The renaissance and the reformation in Europe challenged the existing theocratic
state leading to the formation of territorial monarchic states in Europe. The
philosophers in those days started to embrace the political changes and started to
write on the nature of functioning of territorial states. After observing the politics of
the city state of Italy, Niccolo Machiavelli wrote that, the prince in the modern state
should not be bound by natural or cannon laws. For him, there should be a set of
rational, scientific and secular laws to regulate the ruling subject. Martin Luther on
the other hand, proposed for a two-fold arrangement of the functioning of modern
territorial state: spiritual realm controlled by priests and the worldly matters
controlled by the prince and judges. These writings later helped scholars to develop
the idea of sovereignty.
Jean Bodin proposed that religious and civil conflicts prevalent in France during his
time could be solved with the formulation of an unrestricted ruling power, sovereign
authority, which is competent to overrule all religious and customary authorities.
According to this, within every political community there must be a determinate
sovereign authority whose power are decisive, unquestionable and recognized by
the community as the rightful basis of authority. Later Thomas Hobbes projected the
idea of sovereignty where individual has to surrender all his or her rights and
powers to the hands of an individual who thereby become the sovereign, the ruler.
On the contrary, writings of Rousseau reflected the transferring of the sovereignty
from the rulers to the people, as they become mere co-coordinators of the rules and

regulations made by the people for their goods. This idea later becomes the corner
stone for the democratic ruling system in different parts of the world.
Internal sovereignty
Internal sovereignty refers to the sovereignty enjoyed by the state within its
territory and jurisdiction. The legal and political sovereignties are crucial to
understand the internal sovereignty of a state. Through the legal sovereignty, state
can impose rules and regulations upon its citizen, regardless of his or her social,
political and economic positions. In return, individual rights are provided by the
state to its citizen aiming their safety, security and dignity of life. Political
sovereignty of the state deals with the political power enjoyed by the state to
impose certain power on its citizen to attain any of its motives even using
repressive actions. Police and military organizations are set up for this purpose. The
internal sovereignty thus generally mean that within its territory, the state have the
right to enjoy a sovereign power over its citizens, resources, institutions etc. no
other state can interfere in the decision making process of the state in these areas.
According to the type of ruling system existing in a political community, the nature
of internal sovereignty also changed. In the monarchic set up therefore, the
sovereignty is centered on an individual or the legislative body. While in a federal
set up, it would be shared by the union as well as the provincial states. It is the
constitution of a state which determines and put up guideline about the nature of
sovereignty of the state. The internal sovereignty is also found to be shared by
number of groups and institutions of the state. Thus the law making aspect of State
is dealt by the legislative body, Judiciary its constitutional aspects whereas the
bureaucratic organizations and other administrators functions for the
implementation of rules and regulations of the state.
External sovereignty
The external sovereignty is related with the fact that, every state in the world is
sovereign and constitutionally independent from other states. In the external
sovereignty, if one state encounters any issues with its neighboring or any other
state, they are supposed to mitigate with each other. However, the two world wars
and the globalization in last two decades lead to a situation where, the issues
between two or more states does not limit to themselves and affect the whole
world. This further lead to the formation of international rules, regulations and
guidelines to be followed by all nations in the world. The formation of United Nations
after the Second World War therefore aims to form a general consent among the
nation regarding international relations. The liberalization of the economy in more
than last two decades leads the nations to form alliances and associations in
economic spheres. The European Union in Europe and SAARC in south Asia are
prominent examples for this. Apart from this we have witnessed various trade
agreements between nations in the world like general agreement of trade and tariff

(GATT), general agreement on trade and services (GATS) etc. These changing
situations further prompted nations to liberate their sovereign power in certain
sectors where, other nation can play vital role in determining their policies.
Thus, the history of the emergence and development of the idea of sovereignty
suggests that, with the changing nature of the political and economic areas in the
world, the nature of the idea of sovereignty is also getting changed.