Constituents Before Assembly: Participation, Deliberation, and Representation in the Crafting of New Constitutions

ISBN-13: 9781316619551 / Angielski / Miękka / 2018 / 222 str.

Todd A. Eisenstadt; A. Carl Levan; Tofigh Maboudi

Opis

When building democracy through new constitutions, the level of participation matters more than the content of the constitution itself. This book examines this theory.

Recenzje

'Comparative constitutional analysis is quite literally as old as Aristotle, as scholars have sought to find the wisest design for political institutions. But recently specialists have realized that politics as much as wisdom is at issue and they have turned their attention to the process by which constitutions are written. The authors of this empirically careful and conceptually sophisticated inquiry walk us through the political implications of who gets a voice, when, and how during a country's constitution drafting process.' Nathan J. Brown, George Washington University, Washington, DC and Carnegie Endowment for International Peace

Spis treści

Introducing constitutions as political process; 1. A call to pens (even if not mightier than swords): how context and process prevail over content in constitutional change; 2. Making the constituents King: how constituent deliberation on new constitutions democratizes more than mere citizen participation; 3. Parchment politics: the importance of context and conditions to the convening of constitutions; 4. The logic of 'top down' elite constitutionalism: how imposed processes may (but usually do not) produce better democracy; 5. The logic of 'bottom up' constitutionalism: how popular processes tilt the odds in favor of democracy; 6. Interest groups versus individual participation, and the gap between ideal constitutional process and real world practices.