Skip to main content Accessibility help

We use cookies to distinguish you from other users and to provide you with a better experience on our websites. Close this message to accept cookies or find out how to manage your cookie settings.

Close cookie message
×
Hostname: page-component-55f67697df-4ks9w Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2025-05-08T18:38:04.228Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

1 - Introduction

Constitutions in Authoritarian Regimes

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 June 2014

Edited by
Tom Ginsburg  and
Alberto Simpser
Tom Ginsburg
Affiliation:
University of Chicago
Alberto Simpser
Affiliation:
University of Chicago
Get access

Summary

An old Soviet joke has it that a man goes into a restaurant and surveys the menu. “I’ll have the chicken,” he says, only to be told by the waiter that the restaurant is out of chicken. He asks for the beef, only to be told the same thing. Working his way through the menu, he is repeatedly told that the restaurant is out of the selected dish, until he gets upset and says, “I thought this was a menu, not a constitution.” The joke captures the usual perception of dictatorial constitutions as meaningless pieces of paper, without any function other than to give the illusion of legitimacy to the regime.

But this view raises a puzzle. Formal written constitutions are ubiquitous features of modern nation-states and are found as often in autocracies as in democracies. Furthermore, they are costly to adopt, consuming significant political energy and time. Stalin, along with many Soviet elites, played a direct role in drafting the 1936 Constitution and took the process quite seriously (Getty 1991: 22). The seventeen years required to draft the recent constitution of Myanmar may have been exceptional, but there is no doubt that some authoritarians spend political effort on constitution making. Why would they bother to do so if the documents are meaningless? The standard answer that the constitution is a legitimating device begs the question: How can an obvious sham document generate any legitimacy?

Type
Chapter
Information
Constitutions in Authoritarian Regimes , pp. 1 - 18
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2013

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Book purchase

Temporarily unavailable

References

Balme, Stéphanie and Dowdle, Michael W.. 2009. “Introduction: Searching for Constitutionalism in 21st Century China.” In Building Constitutionalism in China, edited by Balme, Stephanie and Dowdle, Michael. New York: Palgrave Macmillan. New York: Palgrave Macmillan.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Barros, Robert. 2002. The Constitution of Dictatorship. New York: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Barros, Robert. 2012. “On the Outside Looking In: Secrecy and the Study of Authoritarian Regimes,” manuscript, Argentina, Universidad de San Andrés.
Bodin, Jean. 1576 [1992]. On Sovereignty. Ed. Julian Franklin. New York: Cambridge University Press.
Brown, Nathan. 2011. “Reason, Interest, Rationality, and Passion in Constitution Drafting.” PS: Political Science & Politics 6(4): 675--89.
Bui, Ngoc Son. 2011. “Constitutional Developments in Vietnam.” Paper presented for Fourth Asian Constitutional Law Forum, Hong Kong University.
Clarke, Donald. 2003. Puzzling Observations in Chinese Law: When is a Riddle Just a Mistake? In Understanding China's Legal System: Essays in Honor of Jerome Cohen, edited by Hsu, C. Stephen. New York: New York University Press.Google Scholar
Elkins, Zachary, Ginsburg, Tom, and Melton, James. 2009. The Endurance of National Constitutions. New York: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Elster, Jon. 1995. “Forces and Mechanisms in the Constitution-Making Process.” Duke Law Journal 45: 364–408.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Fearon, James. 2011. “Self-Enforcing Democracy.” Quarterly Journal of Economics 126(4): 1661–1708.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gandhi, Jennifer. 2008. Political Institutions Under Dictatorship. New York: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gehlbach, Scott and Simpser, Alberto. 2012. “Electoral Manipulation as Bureaucratic Control,” unpublished manuscript, University of Wisconsin, Madison, and University of Chicago.
Getty, J. Arch. 1991. “State and Society under Stalin: Constitutions and Elections in the 1930s.” Slavic Review 50: 18–35.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ginsburg, Tom. 2009. “Constitutional Afterlife: The Continuing Impact of Thailand's Post-Political Constitution.” International Journal of Constitutional Law 7: 83–105.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Golove, David and Hulsebosch, Daniel. 2010. “A Civilized Nation: The Early American Constitution, the Law Of Nations, and the Pursuit of International Recognition.” New York University Law Review 85: 932–1066.Google Scholar
Hirschman, Albert O. 1986. Rival Views of Market Society and Other Recent Essays. New York: Viking.Google Scholar
Hollyer, James R. and Rosendorff, B. Peter. 2011. “Why Do Authoritarian Regimes Sign the Convention Against Torture? Signaling, Domestic Politics and Non-Compliance.” Quarterly Journal of Political Science 6(3–4): 275–327.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Langston, Joy. 2006. “The Birth and Transformation of the Dedazo in Mexico,” pp. 143–159 in Helmke, Gretchen and Levitsky, Steven, eds., Informal Institutions and Democracy: Lessons from Latin America. Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins University Press.Google Scholar
Levitsky, Steven and Way, Lucan A.. 2002. “Elections Without Democracy: The Rise of Competitive Democracy.” Journal of Democracy 13(2): 52.Google Scholar
Levitsky, Steven and Way, Lucan A.. 2010. Competitive Authoritarianism: Hybrid Regimes After the Cold War. New York: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
McNollGast. 1989. “Structure and Process, Politics and Policy: Administrative arrangements and the political control of agencies.” Virginia Law Review, 75: 431–482.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Murphy, Walter. 2006. Constitutional Democracy. Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins University Press.Google Scholar
Murphy, Walter. 1993. “Constitutions, Constitutionalism and Democracy,” pp. 3–7 in Greenberg, Doug-las, Katz, S. N., Oliviero, B., and Wheatley, S. C., eds., Constitutionalism and Democracy: Transitions in the Contemporary World. New York: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Myerson, Roger B. 2008a. “The Autocrat's Credibility Problem and Foundations of the Constitutional State.” American Political Science Review 102: 125–3.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Myerson, Roger B. 2008b. “Leadership, Trust, and Power: Dynamic Moral Hazard in High Office,” mimeo, University of Chicago, October.
Okoth-Okendo, H. W. O. 1993. “Constitutions Without Constitutionalism: An African Political Paradox,” pp. 65–84 in Greenberg, Douglas, Katz, S. N., Oliviero, B., and Wheatley, S. C., eds., Constitutionalism and Democracy: Transitions in the Contemporary World. New York: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Peltzman, Samuel. 1975. “The Effects of Automobile Safety Regulation.” Journal of Political Economy 83(4): 677–726.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Root, Hilton T. 1989. “Tying the King's Hands: Credible Commitments and Royal Fiscal Policy During the Old Regime.” Rationality and Society 1(2): 240–58.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sajo, Andras. 2011. Constitutional Sentiments. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.Google Scholar
Schedler, Andreas. 2006. Electoral Authoritarianism: The Dynamics of Unfree Competition. Boulder, CO, and London: Lynne Rienner Publishers.Google Scholar
Simpser, Alberto. 2013. Why Governments and Parties Manipulate Elections: Theory, Practice, and Implications. New York: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sunstein, Cass R. 1993. After the Rights Revolution: Reconceiving the Regulatory State. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Weingast, Barry. 1997. “The Political Foundations of Democracy and the Rule of Law.” American Political Science Review 91(2): 245–63.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

Save book to Kindle

To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure [email protected] is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.

Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.

Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.

  • Introduction
  • Edited by Tom Ginsburg, University of Chicago, Alberto Simpser, University of Chicago
  • Book: Constitutions in Authoritarian Regimes
  • Online publication: 05 June 2014
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9781107252523.001
Available formats
×

Save book to Dropbox

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.

  • Introduction
  • Edited by Tom Ginsburg, University of Chicago, Alberto Simpser, University of Chicago
  • Book: Constitutions in Authoritarian Regimes
  • Online publication: 05 June 2014
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9781107252523.001
Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

  • Introduction
  • Edited by Tom Ginsburg, University of Chicago, Alberto Simpser, University of Chicago
  • Book: Constitutions in Authoritarian Regimes
  • Online publication: 05 June 2014
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9781107252523.001
Available formats
×