Constituents Before Assembly
Subtitle: Participation, Deliberation, and Representation in the Crafting of New Constitutions
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Published: 2017
Language: eng
Number of pages: 218
ISBN-13: 9781107168220
Subjects: Constitutional law
Description: Under what circumstances do new constitutions improve a nation's level of democracy? Between 1974 and 2014, democracy increased in 77 countries following the adoption of a new constitution, but it decreased or stayed the same in 47 others. This book demonstrates that increased participation in the forming of constitutions positively impacts levels of democracy. It is discovered that the degree of citizen participation at the 'convening stage' of constitution-making has a strong effect on levels of democracy. This finding defies the common theory that levels of democracy result from the content of constitutions, and instead lends support to 'deliberative' theories of democracy.