Constitutional Law and Politics: Theory and History

The course has three overarching aims. First, to offer advanced students of the law program in depth theoretical and historical but also comparative knowledge about constitutional law and politics. Thus, the course explores what a constitutional point of view might entail, which forms constitutional reviews can take and how principles such as the rule of law can be interpreted. The course will also zoom in on the legal, political and philosophical debates about a few specific constitutionally guaranteed rights and freedoms such as the freedom of religion and the right to property. Second, the course will equip the students with a range of useful skills for the writing of a thesis in law, and more generally for doing research in law. Finally, the course is also intended to function as a collaborative exploratory space in which instructors and students together explore the field of constitutional law and politics and try out arguments.

The course has two parts. The first part (6 weeks) is primarily geared at reading and discussing the readings in seminars. A few lectures will also be offered. The focus of the second part of the course (4 weeks) is on writing and research design. The students will write an essay that is to be presented and defended at a seminar at the end of the course, in which other students will act as opponents.