State committee (Arab Union)

A state committee (Arabic: لجنة الدولة lajnat ad-dawlah; pl. لجنات الدولة lajnāt ad-dawlah) is a type of executive department of the federal government of the Arab Union.

Like ministries, state committees are directly subordinate to the Council of Ministers, the top executive body and Cabinet of the Prime Minister of the Arab Union; each state committee chairperson is thus a member of the Council of Ministers like the ministers who head particular ministries.

Unlike ministries, however, which are assigned administration of a well-defined responsibility of state or economy which practically never overlap, state committees are instead defined by their adherence to a specific mission, which despite often involving a significant degree of independent activity can involve a similar degree of overlap with the jurisdictional areas of responsibility of ministries.

State committees are exclusively federal in nature, with republican executive governments only overseeing ministries. However, many state committees, despite ultimately answering to the federal government, have a subordinate directorate in each republic responsible for carrying out the committee's responsibilities in that particular republic, which usually answer to the respective republican government in addition to the committee chairperson who is part of the federal cabinet.