In 1949, United Nations Constitutional Assistance (UNCA) was conceived to promote the Western liberal constitution. This was colonial trusteeship. However, in 1960, as a step towards decolonization, the United Nations General Assembly rejected internationalized constitution-making, and, by extension, UNCA. All colonies acquired the right to draft their own constitutions without any international assistance. Nonetheless, in the same year, UNCA was revived and since then it has helped over 40 developing sovereign states to adopt the Western liberal constitution, for the aims of building peace, preventing conflict, and promoting good governance in these independent states. This book scrutinizes UNCA and its off-shoot, UN/International Territorial Administration (ITA), including their historical origins and revival from 1960 to 2019. Sripati argues that although the United Nations (UN) uses UNCA to help developing sovereign states secure debt relief, it undertakes UNCA to ‘modernize’ them with a view to ‘strengthen’ their supposedly weakened sovereignty. By doing so, the UN is seeking these states’ adoption of a Western liberal-style constitution, thus violating their right to self-determination. The book shows how UNCA sires and guides UN (legislative) assistance in all state-sectors: security, judicial, electoral, commercial, parliamentary, public administration, and criminal. Irrespective of UNCA’s benevolent motivations, such intrusive interventions impose the old forms of domination and perpetuate global inequality.

Post 1960, all colonies enjoyed the right to sculpt their own constitutions without international assistance. Yet, from 1960-2018, over poor 40 sovereign states have adopted with United Nations Constitutional Assistance (UNCA) the Western liberal constitution. Why? A comprehensive study on UNCA, this book shows that based on the UN's official statements, UNCA works ostensibly to 'modernise' poor states. However, this results in an investor-friendly environment that largely benefits powerful transnational interests, only to secure debt-relief. Thus, political control that they experienced when they were colonies, continues in this post-colonial era.

In Making Globalization Happen: The Untold Story of Power, Profits, Privilege, Sripati explains how, when, through which entities, and for what purposes economic globalization was catalyzed and its effects on the Global South in general and South Asia in particular. Based on an innovative international constitutional political economy framework, Sripati examines how the Western classical liberal constitution has shaped international law developments in this post-colonial era given its salience and comprehensive scope. Presenting a comprehensive narrative of economic globalization, Making Globalization Happen accurately and comprehensively links constitutional globalization to the following UN family-created agendas: peacebuilding, conflict prevention, human security, protection of civilians, sustainable development, global war on terrorism, women, peace, and security, poverty reduction or market-oriented development, ending conflict-related sexual violence, and justice (climate, criminal, and transitional). Sripati simultaneously provides the missing constitutional foundation for globalization and the fields that it has spawned: global studies and law and political economy. With these ground-breaking insights, Making Globalization Happen: The Untold Story of Power, Profits, Privilege clearly illustrates who drove constitutional globalization and for whose benefit: the UN family and transnational capitalists. Thus, it rips away the facade of UN family-driven peace, justice, human rights, democracy, and development to expose it as a narrative of power, profit, and privilege for transnational capitalists and debt, death, and despair for the Global South.

This book examines the largely neglected but crucial role of transnational actors in democratic constitution-making. The writing or rewriting of constitutions is usually a key moment in democratic transitions. But how exactly does this take place? Most contemporary comparative constitutional literature draws on the concept of constituent power – the power of the people – to address this moment. But what this overlooks, this book argues, is the important role of external, transnational actors who tend to play a crucial role in the process. Drawing on sociolegal methodologies but informed by new legal realism, this book develops a new theoretical framework for examining the involvement of such actors in constitution-making. Empirically grounded, the book uncovers a more comprehensive picture of how constitution-making unfolds on the ground. Illuminating the power dynamics at play during the legal process, it reveals not only the wide range of external actors involved but also the continuity between decolonisation and post-Cold War constitution-making. This book, the first to provide an in-depth examination of external actor involvement in constitution-making, will appeal to scholars of constitutional law, sociolegal studies, law and development, and transitional justice.

This volume addresses the idea of origins, how things are formed, and how they relate to their present and future in terms of 'constitution-making' which is a continuous process in South Asian states. It examines the drafting, nature, core values and roles of the first modern constitutions during the founding of the eight modern nation-states in South Asia. The book looks at the constitutions of Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Maldives, Nepal, Pakistan and Sri Lanka. It provides an explanatory description of the process and substantive inputs in the making of the first constitutions of these nations; it sets out to analyse the internal and external (including intra-regional) forces surrounding the making of these constitutions; and it sets out theoretical constructions of models to conceptualise the nature and role of the first constitutions (including constituent documents) in the founding of the modern nation-states and their subsequent impact on state-building in the region.

The European Yearbook of Constitutional Law (EYCL) is an annual publication devoted to the study of constitutional law. It aims to provide a forum for in-depth analysis and discussion of new developments in the field, both in Europe and beyond. This third volume of the EYCL focuses on constitutional advice, an underexplored topic of legal scholarship today, and addresses this situation by looking beyond constitutional law’s familiar focus on the classic separation of powers and the main legislative, executive and judicial bodies implied by this construct. The attention is shifted to mapping and analysing the advisory bodies and functions grouped around and in support of the legislators, administrators and judges at the frontline of the constitutional edifice, which is accomplished through national, comparative and transnational perspectives on constitutional advice from Europe and beyond. Addressing the topic of constitutional advice is necessary to broaden and deepen not only our understanding of advice as a field in its own right, but also as a way of rendering a fuller account of contemporary constitutionalism. Also, the increasing political polarisation across many societies today underscores the need to study constitutional advice on topics of significance in an attempt to bridge divides and end gridlock. This book will be of special interest to constitutional scholars and legal scholars more generally, as well as to political scientists. In addition, government officials, judges and policy-makers wishing to better understand the legal mechanisms and avenues when it comes to rendering or receiving advice in the contemporary constitutional context will find much of relevance. Jurgen de Poorter is professor at Tilburg Law School, Department of Public Law and Governance. Gerhard van der Schyff is associate professor at Tilburg Law School, Department of Public Law and Governance. Maarten Stremler is assistant professor at Maastricht University, Faculty of Law, Department of Public Law. Maartje De Visser is associate professor at Yong Pung How School of Law, Singapore Management University, Singapore.

This publication is designed to assist United Nations staff who provide human rights advice to States, which undertake to amend an existing constitution or write a new one. It should also be of use to States that undertake constitutional reform, including political leaders, policymakers, legislators and those entrusted to draft constitutional amendments or a new constitution. Further this publication should also facilitate advocacy efforts by civil society to ensure that human rights are properly reflected in constitutional amendments or new constitutions. Finally, this publication, along with the international human rights instruments, should not only provide a standard to measure whether constitutional amendments or a new constitution has appropriately reflected human rights and fundamental freedoms, but also assist in evaluating whether the processes used in constitutional reform are consistent with international procedural norms"--Introduction, page 1.