La Société des Nations et le principe fédéral, 1919-1946

Abstract

The League of Nations, whose Covenant was voted on April 28, 1919 and was included in the Versailles Treaty, was a federal utopia, stemming from the carnage of World War 1 and the craving for peace of the peoples of the world, and even more so of the European peoples. This article briefly calls attention on to the structure and working of this first international organization for peace, points to its limitations, mainly to its failure at making come true the federal principle on which it is based. As for today, the League of Nations will certainly not serve as a model for building a world government, but its failures and its successes might serve as guidelines in the construction of large regional federations which are attempting to circumvent state sovereignties

Keywords

• nationalism
• federal principle
• utopia
• pacifism
• league of nations