Constitutionalism can be viewed from a variety of perspectives, as a historical or sociological phenomenon, philosophical concept or desirable or practical political and legal system.

It can be approached through the prism of certain core ideas such as the limitation of the powers of government, rule of law, or sovereignty. This concept can also be understood more broadly as an aspect of political culture that is related to a wider framework of political, social, and cultural processes, or normative and institutional development.

Although this chapter is presented as a concluding chapter, I will begin with some reflections on the origins and evolutions of modern constitutionalism in Britain, the United States, and France, as countries where this concept is generally considered to be well established. This somewhat substantive discussion could have logically been presented in the first chapter of this book by way of definition of the concept. I have deliberately postponed this comparative review in order to emphasize that these experiences may be useful to consider as comparative, without taking them to as definitive of African constitutionalism. Accordingly, this review is not intended as a comprehensive or up-to-date statement of all relevant developments in those countries. The main point I am trying to make here is that the relevant philosophical underpinnings and political/legal institutions have emerged very gradually, and have been tested and adapted, through a concrete historical process that was highly specific to each setting. The apparent ultimate success of the concept in all three countries was neither immediate nor taken for granted at any point in that long process, indeed the outcome in each case was contingent on a variety of factors, both internal and external to those settings.

This emphasis on local context and possibilities of different “roads” to similar goals should not preclude comparative analysis and theoretical generalization about some of the basic themes and issues of constitutionalism and related concepts. This will be attempted in the last two sections of this chapter, where I offer some general reflections on different theoretical perspectives on the origins and development of constitutionalism, and then examine its symbiotic relationship to democracy.