Eternity in Post-Conflict Constitutions

2021 ◽  
pp. 51-86
Author(s):  
Silvia Suteu
Keyword(s):  
State Building ◽  
International Norms ◽  
Post Conflict ◽  
Political Commitments ◽  
Constitution Making

This chapter analyses eternity clauses as drafting mechanisms that facilitate and safeguard post-conflict constitution-making. It discloses the constitutional bargaining dynamics specific to conflict-affected settings and reveals the largely ignored function of unamendability. It also highlights three distinctive roles played by post-conflict unamendability: signalling compliance with international norms, ensuring electoral turnover, and insulating political and military elites. This chapter shows how contested and sometimes incoherent the unamendable values in post-conflict constitutions can be, reflecting the messiness of constitution-making processes in certain contexts. It outlines the risks associated with expecting too much from eternity clauses in fraught state-building settings that are habitually characterized by institutional weakness and shifting political commitments.

scholarly journals The Rejection of Constitutional Incrementalism in Nepal's Federalisation

2018 ◽  
Vol 46 (4) ◽  
pp. 521-540
Author(s):  
Mara Malagodi
Keyword(s):  
Eighteenth Century ◽  
Collective Identity ◽  
Constitutional Amendment ◽  
Divided Societies ◽  
Contentious Issue ◽  
Post Conflict ◽  
Late Eighteenth Century ◽  
Institutional Choices ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
Constitution Making

The relationship between federalism and identity was the single most contentious issue in the drafting of Nepal's 2015 Constitution, and remains an embattled feature of the country's post-conflict constitutional settlement. This article explains why ‘constitutional incrementalism'—the innovative constitution-making strategy for deeply divided societies theorised by Hanna Lerner—was ultimately (and wisely) rejected in Nepal's federalisation process. Historically a unitary state since its creation in the late eighteenth century, Nepal committed itself to federal restructuring in 2007, but profound disagreements endured over the set of institutional choices concerning the features of Nepal's federal arrangements throughout the constitution-making process (2008–15). Constitutional incrementalism with its emphasis on deferral, ambiguity and contradiction was thought of in some quarters as a pragmatic and instrumental way out of Nepal's political impasse. In the end, the 2015 Constitution expressly named the provinces (even if by just using numbers) and demarcated their boundaries already at the time of its promulgation. Any changes to this framework can only take place by way of constitutional amendment. This article explains why the incrementalist approach was rejected in Nepal's federalisation process, and reflects on the conditions under which constitutional incrementalism may succeed in societies that present profound disagreements over the collective identity of the polity.

scholarly journals The humanitarian protectorate of South Sudan? Understanding insecurity for humanitarians in a political economy of aid

2017 ◽  
Vol 55 (3) ◽  
pp. 349-370
Author(s):  
Bram J. Jansen
Keyword(s):  
Political Economy ◽  
South Sudan ◽  
Humanitarian Aid ◽  
State Building ◽  
Ethnographic Research ◽  
Security Threats ◽  
Post Conflict ◽  
Everyday Practices ◽  
Conflict Situations ◽  
The Everyday

ABSTRACTThis paper aims to contribute to debates about humanitarian governance and insecurity in post-conflict situations. It takes the case of South Sudan to explore the relations between humanitarian agencies, the international community, and local authorities, and the ways international and local forms of power become interrelated and contested, and to what effect. The paper is based on eight months of ethnographic research in various locations in South Sudan between 2011 and 2013, in which experiences with and approaches to insecurity among humanitarian aid actors were studied. The research found that many security threats can be understood in relation to the everyday practices of negotiating and maintaining humanitarian access. Perceiving this insecurity as violation or abuse of a moral and practical humanitarianism neglects how humanitarian aid in practice was embedded in broader state building processes. This paper posits instead that much insecurity for humanitarian actors is a symptom of the blurring of international and local forms of power, and this mediates the development of a humanitarian protectorate.

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