Spectres of Decoloniality: Comparing constitutional histories of India and South Africa

Abstract

Constitutionalism has been in crisis in India and in South Africa in recent times. Theunis Roux, a South African comparative constitutional scholar who has also written extensively on the Indian constitutional experience, is particularly well-placed to diagnose and address this crisis. But Roux here primarily chooses to address one aspect of this crisis which has attracted a lot of public attention lately, the decolonial spectre. That is, the challenge to the legitimacy of the constitutions of these two countries on the grounds that these constitutions are insufficiently derived from indigenous traditions. Roux is not unaware of other aspects of the crisis that plague these two constitutions, as becomes apparent at various points in his piece. But his choice here to focus on the decolonial question, which in theory poses an existential challenge to arguably the two most celebrated constitutions of the global south, conceals as much as it reveals about these other equally fundamental challenges.