Preface
This collection is an important contribution to the comparative study of constitutions. The editors and each author tease out in great detail the complex interplay between national constitutions, on the one hand, and constitutional processes at the sub-national and, in the case of the European Union, at the supranational level on the other.
While much comparative work has been done on national constitutions, the political dynamics of federal and devolved countries can be understood only by reflecting on institutions and processes that exist at each level. To this extent, Michael Burgess and Alan Tarr quite correctly note that “in most federal systems the federal constitution is an ‘incomplete’ framework document, in that it does not prescribe all constitutional processes and arrangements.” Ultimately, constituent units in each system have some degree of flexibility to shape their own institutions, regardless of whether they adopt formal constitutions or not.This volume is quite unique, since it approaches the study of federal constitutions from the perspective of sub-national units, whereas other studies approach the topic with a top–down view of the problems of federalism and constitutions. The chapters systematically deal with issues such as what counts as a constitution at the sub-national level and with how such constitutions differ from federal constitutions and from each other; and they evaluate the extent to which sub-national entities have developed constitutions within the constitutional space allowed by national constitutions. While the editors have brought together twelve case studies drawn from Europe and North America, the findings of this volume have much relevance beyond this transatlantic community. In many post-conflict countries where the Forum of Federations (a global network on federalism and multi-level governance) has worked over the last decade, including Iraq, Sudan, and Ethiopia, there is a real demand for comparative knowledge not just on how to develop sub-national constitutions but also on approaches to delineating and managing boundaries between national and sub-national constitutions.
The interest in sub-national constitutions in these countries is very clearly motivated by the way in which enhanced and codified authority for sub-national units provides a greater degree of protection for minority rights. What marks this survey as being different from previous ones lies in how it approaches the study of the European Union. The impact of European statutes in homogenizing values across member states has effectively constrained the constitutional choices of national governments.On behalf of the Forum of Federations, I express my appreciation to McGill-Queen’s University Press and its executive director Philip Cercone for proposing collaboration on the subject. It was quite appropriate that Alan Tarr, on a visit to Ottawa in 2009, provided the Forum with its initial glimpse into this project when he presented preliminary findings at one of our “lunch and learn” events.
Rupak Chattopadhyay
President and CEO
Forum of Federations
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