Constituent power project attracts Marsden funding
Victoria University Faculty of Law Senior Lecturer Dr Joel Colón-Ríos has been awarded a $420,000 Marsden Fund grant to support a research project on constituent power and the law.
Victoria University Faculty of Law Senior Lecturer Dr Joel Colón-Ríos has been awarded a $420,000 Marsden Fund grant to support a research project on constituent power and the law.
“Constituent power—the popular power to create a constitution—has been traditionally associated with revolutions and extra-legal actions. Nevertheless, this concept has been used by judges, government officials, jurists, and citizens in different jurisdictions to challenge or justify the legal validity of governmental and popular action,” says Joel.
“By studying the functions played by constituent power in the constitutional law of different jurisdictions, the project will consider the extent to which constituent power should be understood as a concept that, like the ‘rule of law' or 'parliamentary sovereignty', is not part of positive law but can be used to assess the legal acceptability of political action.”
The Marsden Fund supports research excellence, allowing New Zealand’s most talented researchers to explore ideas at the forefront of their disciplines. The Fund is administered by the Royal Society of New Zealand on behalf of the Government.
Joel’s project will result in a number of articles, as well as a book currently under contract with Oxford University Press.