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Creating a constitution : law, democracy, and growth in ancient Athens /

A comprehensive account of how the Athenian constitution was created--with lessons for contemporary constitution-buildingWe live in an era of constitution-making. More than half of the world's constitutions have been drafted in the past half-century. Yet, one question still eludes theorists and...

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Detalles Bibliográficos
Clasificación:Libro Electrónico
Autor principal: Carugati, Federica (Autor)
Formato: Electrónico eBook
Idioma:Inglés
Publicado: Princeton : Princeton University Press, [2019]
Colección:Princeton scholarship online.
Temas:
Acceso en línea:Texto completo
Descripción
Sumario:A comprehensive account of how the Athenian constitution was created--with lessons for contemporary constitution-buildingWe live in an era of constitution-making. More than half of the world's constitutions have been drafted in the past half-century. Yet, one question still eludes theorists and practitioners alike: how do stable, growth-enhancing constitutional structures emerge and endure? In Creating a Constitution, Federica Carugati argues that ancient Athens offers a unique laboratory for exploring this question. Because the city-state was reasonably well-documented, smaller than most modern nations, and simpler in its institutional makeup, the case of Athens reveals key factors of successful constitution-making that are hard to flesh out in more complex settings. Carugati demonstrates that the institutional changes Athens undertook in the late fifth century BCE, after a period of war and internal strife, amounted to a de facto constitution. The constitution restored stability and allowed the democracy to flourish anew. The analysis of Athens's case reveals the importance of three factors for creating a successful constitution: first, a consensus on a set of shared values capable of commanding long-term support; second, a self-enforcing institutional structure that reflects those values; and, third, regulatory mechanisms for policymaking that enable tradeoffs of inclusion to foster growth without jeopardizing stability. Uniquely combining institutional analysis, political economy, and history, Creating a Constitution is a compelling account of how political and economic goals that we normally associate with Western developed countries were once achieved through different institutional arrangements.
Descripción Física:1 online resource (xii, 239 pages)
Bibliografía:Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN:9780691198712
0691198713