Constitutionalism And Human Rights A Troubled Continent...

Postcolonialism is a troubled continent of contested conceptions; the challenge and complexity stand aggravated when the unfamiliar guest – the discourse of constitutionalism and human rights – makes appearance at the dining table. Constitutionalism, most generally understood, provides for structures, forms, and apparatuses of governance and modes of legitimation of power. But constitutionalism is not all about governance; it also provides contested sites for ideas and practices concerning justice, rights, development, and individual| associational autonomy. Constitutionalism provides narratives of both rule and resistance. Constitutionalism typically evokes the device of written constitutions; but the texts of the constitution do not always illuminate, much less exhaust, the context of political and social action. Indeed, constitutionalism interrogates the notion of writtenness in at least two ways. First, behind every written constitution lies an unwritten one, which enacts the conventions and usages, the protocols and accouterments of power that resist linguistic codification. Second, the unwritten often overrides that which stands elaborately written, such that we have the paradox of â€Å"constitutions wi thout constitutionalism† (to adapt a notion of OkethOgando). The defense/war power of the executive furnishes the paradigm case of the first; the second stands illustrated by periods of constitutional dictatorships. In these, the acquisition of political power is legitimated