Abstract
<jats:title>Abstract</jats:title> <jats:p>Due to their plurality and the institutionally complex configuration of ‘the people’, federal political orders offer a challenging testing ground for questions of constituent power—particularly in moments of fundamental re-constitution. But is it useful to differentiate between varieties of federalism to understand federal re-constituent power? The chapter argues that federal polities, as particularly dynamic political orders, tend to rely on re-constituent power in situations of fundamental transformation—particularly when it comes to questions of expansion or contraction. However, processes of re-constitution differ fundamentally between different varieties of federalism, especially between centrifugal and centripetal federal constellations. To demonstrate this, the chapter analyses US federalism as a case of centripetal federalism.</jats:p>