Non-configurational languages have a seemingly 'flat' constituent structure, as illustrated above. The presence of the VP constituent in the configurational tree on the left allows one to define the syntactic relations (subject vs. object) in terms of configuration: the subject is the argument that appears outside of the VP, but the object appears inside it. The flat structure on the right, where there is no VP, forces/allows one to view aspects of syntax differently. More generally, Hale proposed that non-configurational languages have the following characteristics: