‘The Torment of Our Powerlessness’: Addressing Indigenous Constitutional Vulnerability through the Uluru Statement’s Call for a First Nations Voice in Their Affairs

2018 ◽  
Vol 41 (3) ◽  
Keyword(s):  
First Nations ◽  
Constitutional Reform ◽  
Constitutional Change ◽  
Suitable Solution ◽  
Constitutional Culture ◽  
Legal Uncertainty ◽  
Parliamentary Supremacy ◽  
Political Communities ◽  
The Right

This article analyses and explores the Uluru Statement from the Heart’s call for a constitutionally guaranteed First Nations voice in their affairs, as constitutional reform intended to address the ongoing problem of Indigenous constitutional vulnerability and powerlessness. It contends that a First Nations voice is a suitable solution: it coheres and aligns with Australian constitutional culture and design which recognises, represents and gives voice to the preexisting political communities, or constitutional constituencies. The article evaluates, compares and attempts to refine drafting options to give effect to a First Nations constitutional voice, by reference to principles of constitutional suitability, responsiveness to concerns about parliamentary supremacy and legal uncertainty, and assessment of political viability. The article concludes that the proposal for a constitutionally enshrined First Nations voice strikes the right conceptual balance between pragmatism and ambition, for viable yet worthwhile constitutional change. With appropriate constitutional drafting and legislative design, such a proposal offers a ‘modest yet profound’ way of meaningfully addressing Indigenous constitutional vulnerability, by empowering the First Nations with a voice in their affairs.

scholarly journals Progressive Eras, Periods of Reaction, and Constitutional Change

2014 ◽  
Vol 15 (3) ◽  
pp. 437-459 ◽  
Author(s):  
Danny Nicol
Keyword(s):  
Social Influence ◽  
Crucial Role ◽  
Political Community ◽  
The Political ◽  
Constitutional Change ◽  
General Phenomenon ◽  
Labour Government ◽  
Liberal Government ◽  
Political Communities ◽  
The Right

This article argues that “political herding” plays a crucial role in driving and shaping constitutional change. It links the prevalence of political herding to a psychological phenomenon, “social influence.” It goes on to argue that constitutional change is often driven by the desire for certain substantive policies, which in turn are determined by whether, in a particular epoch, the political community is herding in a progressive or reactionary direction. Contending that the general phenomenon whereby political communities go through recurrent swings to the left or to the right has been neglected by scholars, this essay aims to give this phenomenon the centrality it merits in relation to the evolution of the British constitution. Accordingly it considers the 1906 Liberal government, the 1945 Labour government and the lengthy succession of post-1979 neoliberal governments, analyzing how substantive progressive and reactionary programs led to constitutional change. Finally this article considers the legitimacy both of political herding itself, and of political herding's impact on constitutional change.

Constitutional reform calls mount across Latin America

2021 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Latin America ◽  
Indigenous Communities ◽  
Constitutional Reform ◽  
Constitutional Change ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Constitutional Reforms ◽  
The Status

Significance The debate over constitutional reform will be enlivened by the upcoming election of a constituent convention in Chile on the same day as the Peruvian elections. Impacts Constitutional change may become a banner for the left elsewhere in Latin America. Future constitutional reforms may reconsider the status of indigenous communities in the Amazon. Workers’ rights, include labour stability, may be strengthened.

The Concept of the ‘Living Constitution’ in Russian Constitutional Theory and Practice

2021 ◽  
Vol 46 (3-4) ◽  
pp. 416-445
Author(s):  
Caroline von Gall
Keyword(s):  
Direct Effect ◽  
Paradigm Shift ◽  
Social Conditions ◽  
Theory And Practice ◽  
Constitutional Reform ◽  
Constitutional Theory ◽  
Constitutional Change ◽  
The Past ◽  
Margin Of Appreciation

Abstract In discussing the concept of the ‘living constitution’ in Russian constitutional theory and practice, this paper shows that the Russian concept of the living constitution differs from U.S. or European approaches to evolutive interpretation. The Russian concept has its roots in Soviet and pre-revolutionary Russian constitutional thinking. It reduces the normative power of the Constitution but allows an interpretation according to changing social conditions and gives the legislator a broad margin of appreciation. Whereas the 1993 Russian constitutional reform had been regarded as a paradigm shift with the intention to break with the past by declaring that the Constitution shall have supreme judicial force and direct effect, the paper also gives answers to the complexity of constitutional change and legal transplants and the role of constitutional theory and practice for the functioning of the current authoritarian regime in Russia.

The Case for Repealing the Second Amendment? The Historical Barriers to Constitutional Change

2021 ◽  
Vol 51 (4) ◽  
pp. 595-607
Author(s):  
David T. Konig
Keyword(s):  
Constitutional Law ◽  
Theory And Practice ◽  
The Political ◽  
Constitutional Change ◽  
Second Amendment ◽  
The People ◽  
The Right ◽  
The U.S ◽  
Popular Constitutionalism

The controversy surrounding the Second Amendment—“the right of the people to keep and bear arms”—is, to a large extent, historical in nature, redolent of other matters in this country’s legal and constitutional past. But the historical analogies that might support the Amendment’s repeal do not permit easy conclusions. The issue demands that legal historians venture beyond familiar territory to confront unavoidable problems at the intersection of theory and practice and of constitutional law and popular constitutionalism. An interdisciplinary analysis of Lichtman’s Repeal the Second Amendment illuminates the political, legal, and constitutional dimensions—as well as the perils—of undertaking the arduous amending process permitted by Article V of the U.S. Constitution.

scholarly journals Gender Participation on Rice Post-harvest Activities in Bangladesh

2015 ◽  
Vol 8 (1) ◽  
pp. 45-50 ◽  
Author(s):  
M Jahan ◽  
JR Sarker
Keyword(s):  
Natural Resources ◽  
Survey Data ◽  
Decision Maker ◽  
Harvest Management ◽  
Participatory Approaches ◽  
Farm Level ◽  
Post Harvest ◽  
Suitable Solution ◽  
The Right ◽  
Gender Participation

The study was undertaken to examine the extent of women along with men participated in post-harvest activities; to identify the problems and constraints faced by them and find suitable solution from their perception. The post-harvest activities were estimated at farm level in Aman rice at Rangpur, Nilphamari, Khulna, Satkhira and Jessore district of Bangladesh by using survey data collected randomly from 270 rice growing households for the year 2012-13. It employed participatory approaches to investigate farmers’ perceptions on post-harvest management. The analyses shows women spends more time (591 hours ha-1) on PH activities than men (581 hours ha-1) but the ultimate decision maker of those activities are male indicating that women are very seldom given the opportunities to implement their ideas for execution although they are now gaining the right to give their opinion because of social awareness.J. Environ. Sci. & Natural Resources, 8(1): 45-50 2015

Sexual Choice

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Anne C. Dailey
Keyword(s):  
Sexual Coercion ◽  
Central Place ◽  
Professional Relationships ◽  
Patient Relationship ◽  
Sexual Relations ◽  
Sexual Autonomy ◽  
Constitutional Culture ◽  
Psychoanalytic Perspective ◽  
The Subject ◽  
The Right

The right of sexual autonomy occupies a central place in our constitutional scheme of individual liberties. Consensual sexual relations, including fornication, adultery, and sodomy, now presumptively lie beyond the reach of law’s regulatory power. But as this chapter shows, there is one long-standing law banning consensual sexual relations that remains solidly on the books in every state: the prohibition on adult incest. The subject of adult incest opens the door to a psychoanalytic perspective on the right of sexual autonomy and the modern laws regulating sexual choice. The chapter explores how powerful unconscious forces deriving from the parties’ close familial relationship render the “choice” to have sex a potentially tragic illusion. Similar kinds of unconscious coercion can happen in other contexts as well. For example, the therapist-patient relationship also involves forms of unconscious coercion not known to the parties themselves, and deserving of some regulation. Understanding in close detail the unconscious dynamics in adult incest and the therapist-patient relationship can illuminate less obvious forms of sexual coercion in more common types of professional relationships. A psychoanalytic perspective has a crucial role to play in defining the range and meaning of sexual autonomy as a fundamental right in our constitutional culture.

Conclusion

2021 ◽  
pp. 307-322
Author(s):  
Jonathan Bradbury
Keyword(s):  
Northern Ireland ◽  
Cultural Context ◽  
Central Government ◽  
Labour Party ◽  
Constitutional Reform ◽  
Constitutional Change ◽  
The Third ◽  
The Social ◽  
Territorial Politics ◽  
The Uk

The book has provided four sets of conclusions. First, the examination of territorial strain, the nature of territorial problems and the characteristics of background conditions gives us a lens through which to evaluate critically the social, economic and cultural context to territorial politics. The second set of conclusions relate to the approaches used in the movements for territorial constitutional change in exploiting the support they did have and overcoming those weaknesses that still existed. As part of the reality of how territorial change happens it is to be expected that in the particular case of the UK that all territorial movements emerged out of party political contestation and self-interested party choices, and then had to define approaches heavily determined by party constraints. The third set of conclusions relate to UK central government. The UK centre was also in part defined by the pursuit of party power, and the key party at the UK level ready to address territorial constitutional reform — the Labour Party — faced large challenges and anxieties after 18 years out of office when they prepared for the 1997 general election. The final set of conclusions relate to the importance of constitutional policy processes to the resolution of conflicts in centre–periphery relations. Approaches to the development of devolution policy were followed which made the best efforts to achieve territorial balance under the constraints that they faced. The policy processes in Scotland and Northern Ireland achieved sometimes high, but at least sufficient, levels of inclusiveness in their mechanisms of negotiation.

Destituent Power

2020 ◽  
pp. 123-138
Author(s):  
Markus Patberg
Keyword(s):  
Civil Disobedience ◽  
Popular Sovereignty ◽  
The Political ◽  
Constitutional Change ◽  
Constituent Power ◽  
Public Authorities ◽  
Protest Movements ◽  
The Public ◽  
The Right ◽  
The Eu

This chapter takes up the public narrative of ‘We, the multitude of Europe’, which suggests that the only hope for progressive change in the EU lies in a politics of disruption, and asks whether this idea can be defended based on a systematic model. To that end, it resorts to the political theory of destituent power, according to which opposition to or withdrawal from public authority can function as a legitimate trigger for constitutional change. Distinguishing between anti-juridical and juridical conceptions of destituent power, the chapter discusses to what extent the disruptive political strategies put forward by protest movements in the EU can be regarded as justifiable. Focusing on the juridical strand as the more plausible one, it argues that ideas of destituent power as ‘state civil disobedience’ run into a problem of authorization. By contrast, popular sovereignty-based approaches illuminate a neglected dimension of constituent power: the right to dismantle public authorities without the intention to create new ones. While such a model of destituent power in part captures the actions and demands of EU protest movements, it can only complement, not replace, the constructive side of constituent power.

scholarly journals La prohibición de partidos políticos en Alemania. Del nuevo criterio de la potencialidad y la reciente reforma constitucional para la no financiación de formaciones antidemocráticas pero constitucionales // The prohibition on political parties in Germany. The new criterion of potentiality and the recent constitutional reform for not funding anti-democratic but constitutional formations

2018 ◽  
Vol 1 (102) ◽  
pp. 235
Author(s):  
Pablo Fernández de Casadevante Mayordomo
Keyword(s):  
Political Parties ◽  
State Funding ◽  
Constitutional Reform ◽  
Constitutional Court ◽  
Legal Implications ◽  
Federal Constitutional ◽  
Legislative Framework ◽  
Principle Of Proportionality ◽  
The Right ◽  
New Criterion

Resumen:El año 2017 fue testigo de importantes acontecimientos en relación con el fenómeno de la ideología de ultra derecha en Alemania. Si en enero, el Tribunal Constitucional Federal fallaba en contra de la prohibición del  NPD pese a reconocer el carácter antidemocrático de sus objetivos, en julio entraba en vigor una reforma constitucional para excluir de la financiación estatal a formaciones políticas que, siendo contrarias al orden democrático, no sean objeto de prohibición al carecer del potencial necesario para alcanzar sus objetivos. A modo de colofón, septiembre finalizaba con la celebración de elecciones federales y la entrada de la AfD en el Bundestag como tercera fuerza política. A la luz de todo ello, en el presente trabajo se apuesta por el análisis de las principales implicaciones jurídicas derivadas de dichos hechos, ello con el ánimo de ofrecer al lector una visión actualizada sobre el control jurídico aplicable a la ideología de los partidos políticos en Alemania.Summary1. Introduction. 2. The right of every democratic system to its self-defence. 2.1. Theoretical approach. 2.2. Express intangibility clauses and ideological control. 3. The defense of democracy and political parties in the German legal system. 3.1. The German concept of militant democracy. 3.2. Legal regime applicable to anti-democratic political parties. 3.2.1. Constitutional framework. 3.2.2. Basic legislative framework. 4. The German jurisprudential adaptation to the ECHR conventionality control: the NPD case. 4.1. The necessity test according to the ECHR jurisprudence. 4.2. Potentiality as a substitute for the principle of proportionality. 4.3. Anti-democratic but constitutional. 5. Main observations after the recent constitutional reform. 6. Conclusions. Bibliography.Abstract:2017 witnessed important events in relation to the phenomenon of the right-wing ideology in Germany. First, in January, the Federal Constitutional Court ruled against the prohibition of the NPD, despite recognizing the anti-democratic nature of its objectives; then, in July, a constitutional reform came into effect to exclude from the state funding those political formations that, contravening the democratic order, are not prohibited as they lack the necessary potential to achieve their objectives. To conclude, September ended with the holding of federal elections and the entry of the AfD into the Bundestag, as the country’s third largest force. In light of all this, the present work is committed to the analysis of the main legal implications derived from these events, this with the aim to offer the reader an updated view on the legal control applicable to theideology of political parties in Germany.

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