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In the face of a threat to democratic rule, a Brazilian electoral court barred its former president, Jair Bolsonaro, from holding office for eight years. Unfortunately, the United States lacks a similar electoral court to protect the integrity of the electoral process—in fact, our electoral system is organized in such a way that it invites attacks on its integrity. These problems in design can be traced back to the US Constitution, which, notwithstanding its durability and historical greatness, suffers from certain defects that leave the United States vulnerable to democratic back-sliding. Principal defects include the method of presidential elections via the Electoral College, the two-senator-per-state rule in the upper chamber of Congress, and, perhaps most damaging of all, the method for amending the Constitution. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Labour manifesto in this year's election implied a radical restructuring of the UK state, the way in which England is governed and in relations across the United Kingdom. The aim of making English devolution the ‘default option’ is set against fifty years of unsuccessful and partial devolution initiatives which have failed to reverse the accretion of power in the central UK state. Centralisation can be seen as the consequence of an Anglocentric constitutionalism which vests power in the centre, underpins England's fragmented departmental governance and where accountability mechanisms flow to HM Treasury. Labour's success will reflect its willingness to challenge these constitutional assumptions, which are deeply embedded in the culture, practice and structures of Westminster and Whitehall. Successful devolution will require breaking the chains of accountability that tie local spending decisions to the centre and placing devolved English local government on a stronger constitutional basis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Basic Structure Doctrine, developed by the Supreme Court of India to protect the Constitution of India 1950 from undesirable amendments by Parliament, has seen tremendous growth in its 51 years of existence. This paper argues that despite its evolving scope, the doctrine suffers from an abstraction problem: it insufficiently addresses the abstraction level at which basic features should be identified. The judicial techniques employed to identify these features also do not adequately address this problem. A review of the Supreme Court's application of the doctrine in cases involving a basic structure challenge to constitutional amendments reveals that basic features have been identified at varying abstraction levels. Consequently, this paper proposes a "stratification test" that categorizes the Constitution's basic features and the facets of these features as two distinct abstraction levels. It argues that recognizing and stratifying varying abstraction levels is essential for effective constitutional dialogue, experimentation, and governance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article focuses on the historical and contemporary significance of the Magna Carta in shaping legal principles in England and the United States. Topics include the Magna Carta's historical influence on the U.S. Constitution and Supreme Court rulings, its continuing reference in modern legal cases, and the role it plays in current legal arguments, particularly in relation to due process and rights.

Article I, Section 19 of the New York State Constitution--often referred to as the Green Amendment--guarantees each New Yorker's right to "clean air and water, and a healthful environment." This Note considers the possibility that Green Amendment litigation will slow the development of renewable energy projects in the state. New Yorkers have long worried about the environmental impact of renewables, and they have frequently used litigation and local politics to delay, modify, or block projects they believe will cause more harm than good. In August 2023, New York saw its first Green Amendment lawsuit over a solar energy facility. There will likely be more. I argue that New York courts should think of Green Amendment cases that pit climate action against fundamental environmentalist values such as community input, process, and conservation as involving conflicts of essentially incommensurate environmental rights, and that they should leave the question of how to balance them largely to the political branches. In doing so, I demonstrate the Green Amendment can accommodate the environmental tradeoffs that accompany rapid renewables development without reducing the provision to a constitutional triviality, leaving room for the robust judicial enforcement of Green Amendment rights in other cases. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

How transparent are state governments in the United States? This Article explores the functioning of important, but often underappreciated, actors in the American constitutional system - state administrative agencies - and examines variation in the existence and implementation of transparency regimes across and within all 50 states. This Article first highlights differences that exist among state freedom of information ("FOI") laws, focusing on three components: who can submit requests; the requirements for and exemptions to public release; and the process for appeal of agency decisions not to disclose information. Because FOI laws require the public to request access to information and permit state agencies to refuse release of records, these laws constitute "passive" transparency and have little effect without a strong administrative apparatus to facilitate implementation. Simply, FOI laws rely on administrators to interpret statutory language in ways that provide access to government information. Because passive transparency regimes like state FOI laws require high-quality administration in order to be effective, this Article presents a novel exploratory field experiment of administrative performance across all 50 states. Specifically, this Article evaluates state implementation of FOI laws using an original empirical study of 248 state agencies' fulfillment of the same FOI request. This study illustrates that agency-level factors such as administrative function, policy mission, and leadership influence information disclosure. As a whole, this Article suggests the stringency of transparency law in the states only partially explains government provision of information to the public. Instead, how administrators react to internal and external pressures as they utilize their discretion to fill FOI requests constitutes a key aspect of open government. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Artificial agents create significant moral opportunities and challenges. Over the last two decades, discourse has largely focused on the concept of a ‘responsibility gap.’ We argue that this concept is incoherent, misguided, and diverts attention from the core issue of ‘control gaps.’ Control gaps arise when there is a discrepancy between the causal control an agent exercises and the moral control it should possess or emulate. Such gaps present moral risks, often leading to harm or ethical violations. We propose a second-order ‘duty of moral control’ that mandates closing these gaps to reduce risks within acceptable moral limits. Our analysis encompasses both autonomous machines and collective agents, acknowledging their similarities and key differences in constitution and moral status. We suggest four methods to close control gaps: ensuring artificial agents attain moral agency, providing meaningful human control, implementing safety engineering, and employing social control. These methods aim to responsibly integrate artificial agents into society. We conclude that a realistic approach, which addresses the practical problems posed by control gaps, is essential. This approach provides solutions to manage the risks posed by artificial agents while maintaining acceptable moral standards, ensuring we responsibly harness their potential and address the ethical challenges they present. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

India, as the world's largest democracy, presents a unique and diverse political landscape. Since gaining independence in 1947, it has upheld democratic ideals amidst challenges of diversity, inequality, and external threats. This paper explores the foundational concepts of Indian democracy, its key features, and its role as a beacon of democratic governance in the global arena. By examining India’s electoral system, constitutional framework, and challenges, we gain insights into how democracy functions in one of the most populous and complex nations in the world. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Review of the UK Constitution was an eighteen-month project assessing the functioning of the UK constitution resulting in a set of practical, innovative, and robust recommendations. This article draws out one theme from this research, the offer of Deliberative Mini Publics (DMPs) in the process of constitutional change in the UK. Using Marsh, Richards, and Smith's 'Asymmetric Power Model' as a mechanism for understanding the centralised and top–down nature of British democracy, we argue that the integration of DMPs can offer an opportunity to mitigate some of the core problems with the functioning of the UK constitution and produce better constitutional policy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The status of mathematical facts has long been taken to be unclear in Wittgenstein's philosophy of mathematics, and often, it seems that he wants to eliminate mathematical facts in favour of facts about our beliefs or behaviour. In this paper, I argue that by reading Wittgenstein as a radical conventionalist, we can give a reading of the relevant passages according to which Wittgenstein doesn't deny that there are mathematical facts, but rather denies that one needs a metaphysical account of what mathematical facts are and how they relate to the world that goes beyond the minimal claims of radical conventionalism—that empirical facts about how we would find natural to project our training into new cases and the constitution of concepts by our agreement are enough. At the end of the paper, I discuss the implications of this reading on how to understand a rule's determination of its own application. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In The Federalist, Publius makes five defective assumptions about judicial power, which underestimate and invite the danger of judicial supremacy. Contemporary judicial practice conforms to Publius's assumption that the judicial branch holds final authority in interpreting the Constitution, but contradicts his expectation that this would not lead to judicial supremacy in the political regime. This article excavates and critiques Publius's assumptions about judicial power from a close reading of The Federalist. It argues that any successful check on the judiciary requires adoption of the theory of coordinate construction. It concludes with an exploration of the institutional and normative implications of coordinate construction. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Ancient accounts of Kleisthenes's democratizing reforms to the Athenian constitution in 508/507 B.C.E. do not elaborate on the reasons why these reforms found widespread support and thus proved stable. While scholars are confident that Kleisthenes divided Athenian citizens into ten geographically representative tribes and assigned them to local units of government, they do not agree about why these reforms produced a thoroughgoing democracy. This paper argues that Kleisthenes instituted reforms to religious practices and structures that supplied ideational content to the political reforms. This paper also attempts to demonstrate that some of the religious elements that Kleisthenes repurposed to serve the democratic constitution had been politicized in the previous century. Religious observance was thus one of the sites where contestation about Athens' political direction furnished democratic conceptual vocabulary. Athenians who wished to see civic institutions become more inclusive could be and were appealed to through reforms to everyday religious practice. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The idea that institutional design and institutional change are best explained by the preferences of institution makers who act rationally and strategically is established both theoretically and empirically. However, this literature draws heavily on the experience of Western European democracies. Presenting evidence from the constitutional selection process in post-2001 Afghanistan, this paper contends that institutional selection in emerging democracies follow a similar logic to that of advanced democracies when they were undergoing transitions. The adoption of the 2004 Afghan Constitution is best explained by bargaining among key domestic political elite. The choice of a highly centralized presidential system reflected the preferences of dominant political elite who wanted to ensure their survival and maintain access to power resources of the state. I use process tracing to examine the circumstances under which the 2004 Afghan Constitution was adopted. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Constitutional constraints are undertheorized and overrated. Constitutions are routinely advertised as vehicles for constraining political decisions. Constitutions work when governing officials make decisions on the basis of constitutional rules rather than personal preferences. Officials protect religious liberty rather than advance what their faith teaches is the one true religion. Constitutional constraints are undertheorized because conventional accounts of constitutions as constraining mechanisms fail to explore the strategies available to unsympathetic constitutional decisionmakers bent on frustrating constitutional provisions inconsistent with what they believe to be desirable political arrangements, fundamental rights, vital interests, and cherished policies. President Trump's lawyers claimed that executive orders which Trump had described as a "Muslim ban" were designed to promote national security and not to discriminate against adherents of Islam. Constitutional constraints are overrated because even discounting disobedience, such strategies as invalidation, denial, neglect, off-the-wall interpretation, circumcision, circumvention, and capture frequently enable unsympathetic constitutional decisionmakers to frustrate constitutional provisions while maintaining nominal allegiance to the rule of law. Police officers frequently claim that evidence was "in plain sight" to frustrate implementation of the Fourth Amendment. Strong constitutional constraints work only when unsympathetic constitutional decisionmakers respect the rule of law and are compelled to interpret constitutional provisions as inconsistent with what they believe are desirable political arrangements, fundamental rights, vital interests, or cherished policies. Constitutional provisions constrain unsympathetic constitutional decisionmakers who have some respect for the rule of law only when they cannot invalidate, deny, neglect, interpret away, circumcise, capture, or circumvent the text. Constitutional reformers can preempt these strategies for frustrating constitutional constraints only by quite specific language that eschews appeals to broad values and is likely to be inflexible in response to political, social, and technological changes. One consequence of this narrowing is that constitutional constraints are poor vehicles for widescale social reform. Constitutional transformation requires empowering the faithful, not constraining the unsympathetic. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Although Milton Friedman's mid‐1970s involvement with Pinochet's Chile has generated much controversy, the claim that James M. Buchanan was similarly eager to provide Pinochet's military dictatorship with early 1980s policy advice is increasingly reported as an established fact in the vast scholarly literature on neoliberalism. This article invokes a wealth of previously ignored primary source material that sheds significant new light on Buchanan's early 1980s involvement with Chile. In particular, we evaluate whether Buchanan's May 1980 visit to Chile was an integral part of the Pinochet junta's late 1970s and early 1980s efforts to draft a new constitution. Similarly, we evaluate whether Buchanan's ideas had any significant influence on the views of Pedro Ibáñez and Carlos Cáceres (the most anti‐democratic members of Pinochet's Council of State and the primary hosts of Buchanan's May 1980 visit to Chile). Finally, we shed important new light on Buchanan's participation in the highly controversial late 1981 Mont Pèlerin Society meeting in Chile. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper calls for a paradigm shift in the face of the remarkably common, but ultimately stereotypical and simplistic perceptions of 'Islamic' constitutions requiring all laws to conform to Shari'a. It problematizes the term 'Islamic' to describe disparate constitutions and constitutionalism(s) in Muslim majority countries demonstrating the plurality of 'Islamic' constitutions, locating this descriptor within varied socio-cultural, historical and political contexts of the Muslim world. Plural interpretations of the religious texts in Islam — i.e., the Qur'an and Sunna — and meanings of complex concepts — 'Shari'a' and 'Islamic law', are integral to Islam's (legal) traditions. In Muslimmajority countries, a variety of constitutional texts, court decisions and state practices, demonstrate this plurality. We argue that use of 'Islamic' as a descriptor for heterogeneous constitutional texts, is a product of 'realpolitik' and deployed in this manner, un-nuanced, simplistic, and reductive of the dynamic and plural nature of Shari'a [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Nearly half of all countries have official religions or give preference to specific religious traditions. Most countries with an official religion are majority Muslim; however, most of those with a preference for particular religious traditions are majority Christian. This paper considers empirical data related to constitutional references to specific religions as a framework for a discussion of the comparative constitutional histories of Turkey and the Republic of Ireland. Both moved from systems that preferred their majority religions to ostensive neutrality. This analysis reinforces the importance of religion in law and policy regardless of cultural context and constitutional choices. Constitutional drafters have established a number of approaches to the treatment of religion, including freedom of religion, establishment of religion, separation of religion and state, neutrality, official religion, conformity, repugnancy, and sources of law/legislation. Although these linguistic choices are significant, they may not result in consistent practices across jurisdictions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Tabayyun is the property of Arab Center for Research & Policy Studies and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

AbstractThis paper aims to experimentally and numerically probe thermo-mechanical coupling behaviors of 3D4D (three-dimensional four-directional) braided composite I-beam under four-point flexure. An improved algorithm based on thermo-mechanical coupling constitution model, and mixed failure criterion are devised for modeling thermo-mechanical coupling failure process of 3D4D braided composite I-beam under four-point flexure. Quasi-static four-point flexure tests are, respectively, performed on 3D4D braided composite I-beam at RT (room temperature), −50°C and 85°C, and mechanical behaviors and failure mechanisms are analyzed and discussed from experiment results. To validate the aforementioned model and algorithm, novel global-local FE (finite element) model is generated and integrated with new algorithm for modeling failure process of 3D4D braided composite I-beam under four-point flexure at three temperatures, and numerical predictions agree well with experimental findings, demonstrating the effective and rational use of the proposed model in the paper. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The constitutional tradition is based in normality, which allows to think in a general social ordination through a constitutional document. Against the backdrop of the global environmental crisis, which has been described as a transition to a new geological era, as the Anthropocene; scholars and policy-makers are bound to cope with the new situation through the creation of some kind of new constitutional order as an ecological constitution indeed. But, the global transformation produced by the growing entanglement between society and biosphere is generating such a complex scenario that the pretension of order seems out of place. This paper tries to draw some insights from taking this new complexity and uncertainty that it creates seriously. The proposal is to see (constitutional) law rather as an event than an order, in the assumption of a permanent state of exception. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article traces a path through Bruno Latour's reflections on politics to propose a constitutional reading, which makes ontological and normative lines of investigation intersect. It starts with a discussion of a central theme in Latour's work, that of war and, more generally, opposition and conflicts, and connects it with questions of representation, delegation and decision-making. The preoccupation with land and territories found in Latour's latest work is an invitation to extend his notion of constitution and turn it into a situated matter of critical inquiry. The paper builds on debates and controversies surrounding mineral resources to show the analytical and critical value of constitutional analysis, and the way it can illuminate the ontological and normative issues associated with contemporary problematizations of land and territories. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This essay raises questions about the role of reciprocity as it pertains to the various formulations of the liberal principle of legitimacy as interpreted by Constitutional Essentials. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Constitutions serve to legitimate the exercise of public power. Yet their scope is often subject to reasonable disagreement among citizens in a democracy. As Frank Michelman notes, this points to an understanding of democratic constitutions as a framework for contestation, rather than entrenched set of binding legal constraints. This understanding, however, arguably overlooks the difference between ordinary constitutional norms and those that protect the 'democratic minimum core'. For the latter, there is far less scope for reasonable disagreement, and greater prudential importance to conceptualizing constitutions as entrenched norms authorized strong-form judicial review. The essay thus explores the idea of a 'tiered' approach to constitutional design, which combines elements of strong and weak constitutional entrenchment, and judicial review. In doing so, it further considers the role that transnational norms or practices could play in helping delineate these different constitutional tiers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A crucial insight in Michelman's 'Constitutional Essentials' is that constitutions may serve a justificatory or proceduralizing aim in modern liberal democracies. Yet the pervasiveness of moral disagreement – all-the-way-up; all-the-way-down – suggests, as I will argue, a democratic-experimentalist turn, which focuses on a non-hierarchical process of stakeholder deliberation and the court's role in instigating and overseeing that process, ensuring non-domination. I believe that Frank is exactly right in arguing that a liberally justification-worthy political framework-law-in-place is normatively necessary for democratic politics to succeed in divided societies. But I want to suggest that democratic experimentalism can offer further support to this claim. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Frank Michelman's recent book Constitutional Essentials. On the Constitutional Theory of Political Liberalism is discussed from a specific angle, related to how Rawls's 'deflection procedure' – called by Michelman 'justification by constitution' – is affected by two recent innovations in the paradigm of political liberalism: first, the extension of reasonable pluralism to a family of liberal political conceptions of justice that coexist in a liberal-democratic society; second, the idea of legitimation based on the criterion of reciprocity, aimed at supplementing the liberal principle of legitimacy. In the attempt to probe Michelman's assessment of the impact of these two innovations, three critical points are mentioned, for each of them, that suggest a somewhat more sceptical attitude than Michelman's about the capacity of 'justification by constitution' to remain substantially unaltered, once these innovations are in place. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Soon after the accession of James I to the English throne, the Society of Antiquaries debated the origins of the English Parliament. Records of their debates, notably the tract of Sir John Doddridge, were compiled and circulated widely in manuscript before their print publication during the Interregnum. The tracts asserted that parliaments had ancient origins predating the Norman Conquest and, in Doddridge's case, even the origins of monarchy in England. Scholars have argued that these tracts articulated an understanding of England's immutable "ancient constitution," in which a stance on Parliament's antiquity defined a position on the scope and limitations of royal power. This article explores the tracts in light of the context in which they were written—the putative Jacobean Union, and the new king's assumption of the royal supremacy over the Church of England. It argues that the assertion of the antiquity of Parliament was not incompatible with an understanding of the complex development of the assembly's history over time, especially its mutability at the hands of the Crown. As such, these early attempts to understand the institution's history, and its transformations under different monarchs, may have fueled the existential fears for Parliament's future that characterized the turbulent parliaments of the 1620s. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This essay responds to Geoffrey Kirsch's review essay "What's Past is Prologue: Democracy in the Age of Originalism" by evaluating how the three texts Kirsch reviews—Kermit Roosevelt, III's The Nation That Never Was: Reconstructing America's Story (2022), Cass R. Sunstein's How to Interpret the Constitution (2023), and D. Berton Emerson and Gregory Laski's edited collection Democracies in America: Keywords for the Nineteenth Century and Today (2023)—engage with progressive originalism. Drawing inspiration from civil rights activists including Frederick Douglass, progressive originalists seek to recast an ostensibly conservative method of constitutional interpretation grounded in what the "founding fathers" or a historical public thought or intended. Roosevelt's and Sunstein's books reveal the potential and limits of both progressive originalism and insular disciplinary conversations about constitutional interpretation. Contrastingly, the multidisciplinary Democracies in America has a more expansive conception of whose voices should matter when interpreting the Constitution through a progressive originalist lens. A comparative analysis of the three books also demonstrates the value of literature and literary historians in an age characterized by the ascendancy of historical approaches to constitutional interpretation and a revival of the "canon wars." [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The position of the UK deputy prime minister is clouded in mystery. The title suggests a minster of some seniority, one likely to step in for an absent premier to chair a cabinet meeting or perform at prime minister's questions (PMQs) – but that is merely supposition. No official statement exists to explain the functions the position entails or indeed to confirm that it endures as anything more substantial than a courtesy title. Using archive material and other resources, this article will try to expose this constitutional phantom. To achieve this task, there will be close examination of the first individual to be publicly announced – in February 1942 – as the UK's deputy prime minister, Clement Attlee. Though there will be discussion of some of the tasks Attlee performed in this capacity (tasks which have influenced the development of deputy prime ministership as an institution), the primary purpose of this article is to help lift some of the constitutional smog. In particular, it will illuminate why – in contrast to analogous positions such as the US vice president – the British deputy prime minister is still not regarded as any more likely to succeed a prime minister than any other senior minister. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

On 16 January 2024, the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights (OSCE ODIHR) published its Guidelines on Democratic Law-making for Better Laws. The creation of the Guidelines was driven by the acknowledgment that strengthening democratic institutions and processes is essential in the era of democratic and constitutional erosion and decay and the recognition that contemporary law-making displays several weaknesses. Based on its decades of experience in assessing legislation and legislative processes in the OSCE participating states, ODIHR intended to provide an overview of the guiding principles of the law-making process that ensure that both the process and the resulting laws comply with the requirements of democracy, the rule of law and human rights commitments. The Guidelines offer a new and rich source of inspiration for scholars devoted to strengthening democracy. This paper identifies new(er) avenues for research in democratic erosion and revival, institutional protection of the democratic legislative process, constitutional change, and the impact of constitutional rights. Further, based on some non-OSCE participating states related examples, it shows how the potential inspirational reach of the Guidelines and the research paths it potentially encourage might go beyond the geographic scope of the OSCE participating states. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Most countries affected by the COVID-19 pandemic have proclaimed a state of emergency following their constitutional provisions. Consequently, in response to the outbreak, several countries resorted to utilising the authority vested in their respective governments by the Constitution or preexisting legislation about disasters. Indonesia subsequently responded to extensive criticism from domestic and international experts for its delay in formally declaring a nationwide state of emergency in response to the outbreak. In the initial year of the COVID-19 pandemic, the country experienced significant societal and economic consequences due to inadequate crisis governance. This article argues that the government's response to the COVID-19 outbreak was ineffective in preventing the Pandemic's rapid spread and its adverse impacts on society and the economy. This situation was due to perceived poor quality content and underlying principles of the country's legislation. Consequently, the insufficiency became apparent in the inconsistent strategies employed by both central and local governments in tackling the Pandemic, a need for more expertise among institutional personnel, inadequate allocation of resources for crisis management, limited collaboration among government agencies, and the vulnerability of law enforcement. This article proposes that Indonesia enhance its crisis management legislation to establish a comprehensive framework for the supervision and execution of various outbreak management strategies, including those associated with the COVID-19 pandemic. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article aims to renew the discussion about meaning in the field of psychology. A model is presented that, contrary to the classical view of meaning as an entity taken for granted, explains the dynamics through which it comes to be constituted, opening itself to the possibility of being experienced, as a psychological reality. The autoethnographic analysis carried out by von Fircks (IBPS 53(4):632–643, 2023) is used as example to show how such a model enables an understanding of local phenomena through the comprehension of the semiotic dynamics underlying them. Finally, this paper offers insights into the mechanisms that underlie the field of possibility of meaning-making processes, thus of human experience. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article investigates and critiques the view that Lockean prerogative power is or should be incorporated, legally or extralegally, into the American constitutional system. Some scholars argue that extraconstitutional prerogative represents a safer alternative to a broad legal reading of presidential power, as it creates fewer precedents. Others suggest that the Framers "constitutionalized prerogative." Both of these views have difficulties because ultimately, prerogative can create more dangerous precedents than legal uses of presidential power. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Australian Constitution is only partly 'liberal' (securing political and economic liberties); another part is 'socialist without doctrine' (empowering governments to own and operate vast public capital, while providing social insurance in a market economy). That mixture is common in modern advanced economies but was anomalous in the Anglophone constitutional tradition in 1901. Legislative power over 'old age and invalid pensions', 'railway construction' and 'conciliation and arbitration for the prevention and settlement of industrial disputes' was an accepted part of the incipient Federal scheme but repugnant to Anglophone constitutional orthodoxy of the 19th century. The integration of 'colonial socialism' into the Constitution created one of the longest-standing puzzles in Australian jurisprudence, the Surplus Revenue Case of 1908, and laid the foundations for federal dominance of the Australian economy. Understanding the enduring impact of colonial socialism in Australian constitutionalism sheds light on how Australia's distinctive political economy grew within a 'Washminster' system of government. It also provides principled guidance for future policy challenges that may require expansion of state involvement in the economy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Australian Constitution was drafted, and the institutions of national government were established, during a period in which the atomism of laissez-faire liberalism was being rejected. Instead, progressive liberals of the era were searching for ways to encourage collective action and social ties, believing that this would, in turn, enhance personal wellbeing. This article contends that a clearer appreciation of the influence of the 'social' turn in liberalism upon Australia's constitutional and institutional development might contribute to a fuller understanding of Australia's distinctive constitutional and public law traditions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Customs duties were the first sustainable source of revenue for New South Wales, the colonies that hived off from it, and the other colonial settlements in Australia. From Sydney's original three-roomed customs house, with its wooden walls and bark roof, to the magnificent neo-renaissance palazzo of Melbourne, the neoclassical splendour of the Brisbane Customs House, to a Queen Anne confection in Albany, custom houses became symbols of the Australian colonies' growing economic power. Yet, unlike Anglophone Canada and New Zealand, which also engaged in practices of marginalising First Nations peoples and asserting exclusionary Britannic identities, the Australian colonies were parochial. They competed with one another for revenue and protected their own infant industries. Tariffs played an important role in establishing and maintaining this fractured nationalism; they were also instrumental in healing it. Federation was only made possible by the horse-trading over customs duties that is enshrined in the Australian Constitution. Professor John Taylor's tax history practice included extracting uniquely Australian stories from the grand narrative of international taxation. This article seeks to pay tribute to that approach and investigates custom houses at the time of fractured nationalism as a story which, on the one hand is part of the greater British-heritage narrative of indirect taxation and related architecture, but, on the other hand, is specifically Australian. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Revista Gênero e Interdisciplinaridade is the property of Instituto de Ensino e Pesquisa Periodicojs and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of Revista Româna de Dreptul Muncii is the property of Wolters Kluwer Romania and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of Journal of Management Analysis / Revista Gestão em Análise is the property of Revista Gestao em Analise and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Analysis of revolutions typically focuses on de jure constitutions and how their elite- or mass-led character influences their consequences. De facto constitutions are political and economic rules that people use to govern themselves which may or may not be recognized in the evolving de jure constitution. We argue that the nature of change resulting from revolutions depends on whether the emergent constitutional order recognizes the autonomy of de facto constitutions. We theorize neglect, disregard, and hostility toward de facto constitutions contributes to cycles of constitutional instability. We use this theory to explain Afghanistan's unending revolution. Neither elite-led nor mass-led revolutions in Afghanistan produced a lasting constitutional order because they share a disregard for the de facto constitution. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We use comparative constitutions project (CCP) data to explore whether Constitutions that follow revolutions are designed differently. We employ matching methods using 36 treatments (revolutionary Constitutions) and 162 control units (new Constitutional adoptions without a revolution). We find some evidence that revolutionary Constitutions are less rigid (i.e., their procedural barriers to amendment are weaker). Otherwise, revolutionary Constitutions seem similar to non-revolutionary ones. However, we do find strong evidence that revolutionary Constitutions are associated with a greater likelihood of ex post democracy. The results (less rigid, higher likelihood of democracy) hold for those not associated with ending colonial rule or the fall of the USSR. The greater ex post democracy result is reported for various democracy measures. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Starting from the critical premises that underpin the debate between archeology and architecture, some evidence emerges: sometimes, the musealization of buildings, "urban carcasses" and historical ruins—which are our legacy from the past—is even more harmful than that of any other artefact, for the purposes of their real understanding. In a country like Italy, which has archeological presences more than any other, architecture must contribute to overcoming the consolidated aporia that the Contemporary, conceived not only as a period but also and above all as its "forms and functions", is structurally in opposition to the conservation of archeological heritage. Spatium ad Omnes, the project presented in this article, is an attempted exercise at "inhabiting archaeology", that is, trying to re-grant inclusive usability to a historical fragment, which has lost the elements necessary for its liveability, paying attention to the reversibility of the project itself. The set of questions, doubts and steps preliminary for the design have been highlighted more than the final "figure" of the project: an essential form directly connected with the primordial principles of its constitution. Spatium ad Omnes protects and encourages visiting the complex, trying to offer new perspectives, new narratives and new connections that translate into the possibility of being—for those who visit this place—the protagonists of a unique experience made of history, memory and continuous discoveries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article compares and analyzes the common structural features of apex courts in legal systems that exemplify judicial supremacy. Topics discussed include foundations of apex courts, scheme of government authority, independence and representation in apex courts, subcategories of apex courts, and correlation between the structural features of an apex court and its social, historical, constituent, constitutional, legal, model of democracy and political environment.