Conference is convened by Bruce Ackerman and Richard Albert
August 24‐25, 2018, Event will be held in the Faculty Lounge, Yale Law School (127 Wall Street)
Over two hundred years ago, revolutionary democrats led the world onto a new stage. The American and French Revolutions, followed by those in Greece, Haiti and elsewhere, ushered in an age of revolution that set the foundation for modern democratic constitutionalism. Today, the world has entered a new age of revolution.
There are important differences between revolutions then and now. But what remains unchanged is that revolution had often been in the past and continues to be today the result of substantial years-long, even decades-long, mobilizations of people, resources and ideas oriented toward the normative aspirations of constitutionalism. Revolutionary democrats deploy extraordinary means and seek self-consciously to transform the basis of the state’s legal or political authority with the consent of their fellow citizens. What ultimately validates the revolution is its successful culmination, the consolidation of its values in text or ceremony, the sustainability of the new constitutional order, and the consent of citizens, given by affirmation or acquiescence.
This conference will convene over two dozen of the world’s leading scholars in public law to explore the theme of "Revolutionary Constitutionalism" in comparative, doctrinal, historical, philosophical and theoretical perspectives. Held over two days, the proceedings for this first-of-its-kind conference will be structured around a keynote lecture and seven panels featuring wide diversity in scholars representing many countries and constitutional traditions across the globe.