Description
Oxford University Press Constitutional Statecraft In Asian Courts by Yvonne Tew
Constitutional Statecraft in Asian Courts explores how courts engage in constitutional state-building in aspiring, yet deeply fragile, democracies in Asia. Yvonne Tew offers an in-depth look at contemporary Malaysia and Singapore, explaining how courts protect and construct constitutionalism even as they confront dominant political parties and negotiate democratic transitions.
This richly illustrative account offers at once an engaging analysis of Southeast Asia's constitutional context, as well as a broader narrative that should resonate in many countries across Asia that are also grappling with similar challenges of colonial legacies, histories of authoritarian rule, and societies polarized by race, religion, and identity.
The book explores the judicial strategies used for statecraft in Asian courts, including an analysis of the specific mechanisms that courts can use to entrench constitutional basic structures and to protect rights in a manner that is purposive and proportionate. Tew's account shows how courts in Asia's emerging democracies can chart a path forward to help safeguard a nation's constitutional core and to build an enduring constitutional framework.
Table of Contents
Introduction
Part I: Setting the Scene
1: Rights Rhetoric
2: Constitutional Adjudication and Constitutional Politics
Part II: A Framework for Constitutional Adjudication
3: Constitutional History
4: The Separation of Powers
5: The Rule of Law
6: Courts in Transition
Part III: Applying Constitutional Adjudication in Practice
7: Judicializing Religion
8: Balancing Security and Liberty
Conclusion
Author Information
Yvonne Tew, Associate Professor of Law, Georgetown Law
Yvonne Tew is an Associate Professor at Georgetown University Law Center. She has expertise in comparative and U.S. constitutional law as well as law and religion. She holds a Ph.D. from the University of Cambridge, where she was a Gates Cambridge Scholar. She received a Master of Laws from Harvard Law School and a B.A. from the University of Cambridge. She has held research fellowships at Columbia Law School and New York University School of Law.