Re: <nettime> from Meatloaf to penalty Shoot Outs

On 24 Aug 2019, at 10:52, Dr. Peter Troxler (p&s) <peter.troxler@ps-culture.net> wrote:

So it is not just the referendum, it is how the referendum is used in a rather different system of implementing democracy (oh, and did I mention that the “constitution” is actually a written document in Switzerland, not an assemblage of Acts of Parliament, court judgments and conventions).

Yes the question of different written and unwritten constitutions is interesting and important from the UK’s point of view. Our consitution is supposed to be unwritten but a great deal of it is written but in many different places not in a single document. We are currently supposed to be in a ‘constitutional crisis’. But actually the constitution has (so far) stood up to the current ‘stress test" quite well as parliament has actually succeeded in holding the government to account.

The real test will come when parliament reconvenes in September. Johnson and Cummings have made it clear that they are prepared to defy convention and many of our key protocols (e.g. a Prime Minister resigning and calling a generation if defeated in a vote of no confidence) are not legaly enforcible rather they are normatively binding. Faced with a Speaker prepared to defy convention and government prepared to defy usually binding normative conventions the foundations of our current losely framed constitution and party political framework are likely to tested as never before in generations.

Its a great time to be a constitutional lawyer or a curious observer from another land, but its a bad time for the rest of us.

David Garcia

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