Haiti’s Constitution of 1987

Haiti’s Constitution of 1987 has lasted longer than any of its previous 22 constitutions and is credited with bringing democracy. After a brief review of Haiti’s constitutional past, characterized by instability and violence, this chapter closely examines the 1987 constitution both as against this past and as the country’s foundation for the rule of law. It offers insight into the charter as a rejection of the authoritarianism and brutality of the Duvaliers, father and son, and describes the intent, palpable in the original text, to bring on democracy, human rights, and political liberalism. It emphasizes its insistence on parliamentary supremacy drawing from the political philosophy found throughout the francophone world during France’s third and fourth republics and describes the regime as semi-presidential, similar, and yet significantly different from the Constitution that governs France today. It delves into the principle difference by underscoring how, in contrast, Haiti’s 1987 Constitution expressly limits presidential power. It assesses this difference against the reality of the exercise of presidential power in issuing decrees in practice. It offers in-depth analysis of the revolutionary post-earthquake amendments of 2012 that impose gender equity in public life, eliminate the former prohibition on dual nationality, attempt to address Haiti’s chronic electoral dysfunction and environmental degradation, reinstitute the military, and establish a Constitutional Council with sweeping judicial review power. The chapter also exposes the failings of this constitutional democracy in addressing specific human rights violations and in clinging to an outdated insistence on parliamentary supremacy that potentially undermines constitutional supremacy.