Constitutionalism within Times of Change: Authority, Society and Democracy

Dzhustin Esiobu

doi:10.18523/kmlpj249917.2021-7.149-162

Abstract

This article, following classical methodological patterns, as well as their evolution framework, identifies key features of the two most predominant constitutionalism traditions — political and legal, simultaneously drawing indispensable red lines with regard to correlation of the doctrine and a Fundamental Law itself. Respectively, the features have been rendered as the very elements of constitutionalism’s role within times of change — i. e., over the aforementioned time frames and transition states in between — whereas the doctrine’s capacity to answer so-called “questions of constitutionalism” constitutes its underlying response mechanism. The article addresses the phenomena of authority, society and democracy in their modern perception, and makes crucial points upon the constitutionalism’s effect on their sheer structures.

Highlights

Change — be it a habitual pair of socks substitution or the November 3, 2020 United States presidential election — is a necessary element for individual, societal, and —nationwide, evolution and move forward
The main issue arises in a discussion of the role of a doctrine that effectively constitutes a government’s authority determination by a Fundamental Law—debatably, constitutionalism—over specific time frames and transition states in between (i. e., times of change)
In the context of this article, the prescriptive use includes features constructing the role of constitutionalism within concrete periods of its development as well as within transitions in between, while the descriptive one captures the doctrine’s reaction to changes

Summary

Introduction

Change — be it a habitual pair of socks substitution or the November 3, 2020 United States presidential election — is a necessary element for individual, societal, and —nationwide, evolution and move forward. The main issue arises in a discussion of the role of a doctrine that effectively constitutes a government’s authority determination by a Fundamental Law—debatably, constitutionalism—over specific time frames and transition states in between The entire significance of such an approach manifests itself prevalently through a large-scale observation, as change is an ongoing, almost habitual process This is regardless of how striking single phenomena, such as a COVID‐19 pandemic or other crisis, may seem. They are not able to bring about substantial modifications to the operation of the aforementioned concepts, nor of the constitutionalism without the necessary mechanisms laid out in the article. By dint of, first, explicating the very essence of the term “constitutionalism” and its distinction from merely a constitution; second, formulating and examining the part that the constitutionalism plays within times of change abstractly (including the question of how the mechanism and / or the essence of the doctrine reacts and responds to these changes); third, rendering this role and these reactions onto the three phenomena—authority, society and democracy

Constitutionalism and a Constitution

The Key Traditions of Constitutionalism

Political Constitutionalism

Legal Constitutionalism

Times of Change

Conclusion