Transitional Constitutionalism versus the Rule of Law?

Available in Russian

Available for free

Author: Wojciech Sadurski

DOI: 10.21128/1812-7126-2016-3-13-28

Keywords: constitution-making; decommunisation; lustration; rule of law; statutes of limitation; transitional constitutionalism

Abstract

This article considers some of the features of post-communist transitional constitutionalism, and identify those characteristics which are undisputedly contrary to the rule of law in contemporary democratic constitutional orders. Some aspects of transitional constitutionalism’s “past-orientedness” are in a strong tension with the rule of law. First, by establishing a legally protected orthodoxy about the past the law abandons the function of an impartial umpire, and abdicates the aspiration to generality which is one of the main precepts of the rule of law. Second, by suspending statutes of limitations for crimes which went unpunished due to political motivations – transitional constitutionalism aligns itself with the community’s morality but is likely to offend against the precept of lex retro non agit. Third, by applying various measures of removing members of the old elite, transitional constitutionalism is liable to offend against another cherished principle of the rule of law, nullum crimen, nulla poena sine lege. The article also argues that A device of “transitory constitutional arrangements”, sometimes used in transitional constitutionalism, is incompatible with the rule of law’s requirement of certainty, stability and relative unchangeability of constitutional law. By offending against this principle, transitory constitutional arrangements close the gap between an unentrenched and relatively stable constitutional order and legislative order, thus undermining an important distinction between the fundamental rule of the (constitutional) game and political-legislative decisions taken within that framework.

About the author: Wojciech Sadurski – Challis Professor of Jurisprudence, University of Sydney; Professor in the Centre for Europe, University of Warsaw.

Citation: Sadurski W. (2016) Konstitutsionalism perekhodnogo perioda protiv ver­khovenstva prava? [Transitional Constitutionalism versus the Rule of Law?]. Sravnitel'noe konstitutsionnoe obozrenie, no.3, pp.13–28. (In Russian).

References

Dorsen N., Rosenfeld M., Sajó A., Baer S. (2003) Comparative Constitutionalism: Cases and Materials, St.Paul, MN: West Academic Publishing.

Fuller L.L. (1969) The Morality of Law, 2nd ed., New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.

Kochenov D., Pech L. (2015) Monitoring and Enforcement of the Rule of Law in the EU: Rhetoric and Reality. European Constitutional Law Review, vol.11, no.3, pp.512–540.

Krygier M. (2012) Rule of Law. In: Rosenfeld M., Sajó A. (eds.) The Oxford Handbook of Comparative Constitutional Law, Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Posner E., Vermeule A. (2004) Transitional Justice as Ordinary Justice. Harvard Law Review, vol.117, no.3, pp.762–825.

Přibáň J. (2001) Moral and Political Legislation in Constitutional Justice: A Case Study of the Czech Constitutional Court. Journal of Eastern European Law, vol.8, no.1, pp.15–34.

Rosenfeld M., Sadurski W., Toniatti R. (2015) Central and Eastern European Constitutionalism a quarter century after the fall of the Berlin Wall: Introduction to the Symposium. International Journal of Constitutional Law, vol.13, no.1, pp.119–123.

Sadurski W. (2005) Rights Before Courts: A Study of Constitutional Courts in Postcommunist States of Central and Eastern Europe, 2nd ed., Dordrecht: Springer.

Schwartz H. (1994) The Czech Constitutional Court Decision on the Illegitimacy of the Communist Regime. The Parker School Journal of East European Law, vol.1, pp.392–398.

Sólyom L., Brunner G. (eds.) Constitutional Court decision of 5 March 1992, no.11/1992. In: Constitutional Judiciary in a New Democracy: The Hungarian Constitutional Court, Ann Arbor, MI: University of Michigan Press, 2000. P.214–228.

Teitel R. (2000) Transitional Justice, Oxford: Oxford University Press.