Description
Book SynopsisOffering insights into the origins, successes, and threats to revolutionary constitutionalism, Bruce Ackerman takes us to India, South Africa, Italy, France, Poland, Burma, Israel, Iran, and the U.S. and provides a blow-by-blow account of the tribulations that confronted popular movements in their insurgent campaigns for constitutional democracy.
Trade ReviewAn ambitious and demanding book…What is most valuable in
Revolutionary Constitutions is the sense of drama and detail in the history of constitutional construction…A considerable achievement…worth reading. -- Jeremy Waldron * London Review of Books *
A robust defense of popular sovereignty as both constitutional ideal and practical possibility at a time when nominal democracies around the globe are slinking further away from anything like popular sovereignty…This is a work of bold theorizing and bolder faith (that is the best word for it) in the link between the people and the law, citizens and the state. -- Spencer Dew * Religious Studies Review *
Bruce Ackerman’s
Revolutionary Constitutions is a triumph. It enables the reader to appreciate the many complex factors that contribute to the legitimacy of constitutions and the creation of constitutionalism in a country. In doing so, Ackerman seamlessly navigates events, movements, and a range of charismatic constitutional personalities. He deftly discusses Nehru, Mandela, Ben-Gurion, and de Gaulle, amongst others, and their roles in the making or breaking of constitutional revolutions. -- Dr. Menaka Guruswamy, Advocate, Supreme Court of India
After changing how we think about the U.S. Constitution, Bruce Ackerman is doing the same for the rest of the world. This volume is a remarkable start for what is certain to become one of the most ambitious endeavors in constitutional scholarship: to understand the different beginnings of constitutionalism in the world. -- Miguel Poiares Maduro, European University Institute
From George Washington to Nelson Mandela, and from Ben-Gurion to Ayatollah Khomeini, Ackerman takes his theory of the central role of constitutional politics in the creation and evolution of constitutions into a comparativist sphere and offers a theory of how typical patterns in revolutionary history shape the diverse constitutional challenges and trajectories we see in the world today. A project of grand intellectual ambition and a fascinating read. -- Yochai Benkler, Harvard Law School
