“The Iranian demonstrators share the familiar anxieties produced by global capitalism’s rampant inequalities and environmental destruction. … What makes the demonstrations against malfeasance and the calls for political change and social justice powerful is the fact that the protesters are accusing Iran’s rulers of violating the revolution’s commitment to a moral economy.”
Category: law
Susan Faludi: “The Patriarchs are Falling. The Patriarchy is Stronger than Ever.”
“Which leads me to wonder, if we get rid of a handful of Harveys [Weinsteins] while losing essential rights and protections for millions of women, are we really winning this thing? How is this female calamity happening in the midst of the Female Revolution? An answer may lie in a schism that has haunted women’s…
Boaventura de Sousa Santos: “The Left and Catalonia”
“First, the relationship between law and democracy is dialectical and not mechanical. Much of what we consider democratic legality in a given historical moment started as illegality, as an aspiration to a better and broader democracy. It is therefore imperative to evaluate the political processes in terms of their overall historical dynamics. In no case…
Duncan Ivison: “Why should we obey the law?”
Political obligation “in contemporary politics, where people disagree vehemently about significant political, social and economic issues.”
Stephen Gardbaum: “Revolutionary Constitutionalism”
Since constitution-making seeks to institutionalize and bring to a successful conclusion a political revolution, it “contains within itself certain paradoxes and practical problems that have their source in the combination of initial radical transition and subsequent resistance to further radical change that constitutionalization brings.”
Jack M. Balkin: “How to tell if you are in a constitutional crisis”
When people talk about constitutional crisis in the Trump Administration: ‘A constitutional crisis occurs when there is a serious danger that the Constitution is about to fail at its central task. The central task of constitutions is to keep disagreement within the boundaries of ordinary politics rather than breaking down into anarchy, violence, or civil…