Making We the People
Democratic Constitutional Founding in Postwar Japan and South Korea

This book examines Japan and Korea's post-World War II constitutional history to challenge enduring assumptions about the nature of constitution-making.

Chaihark Hahm (Author), Sung Ho Kim (Author)

9781107018822, Cambridge University Press

Hardback, published 10 December 2015

330 pages
22.9 x 15.2 x 1.9 cm, 0.61 kg

'Making We the People, by Chaihark Hahm and Sung Ho Kim, is an important addition to the literature on comparative constitutional law generally and on constitution-making in particular, on at least two levels. I recommend it highly in relation to both. … Making We the People is a refreshing and welcome entry into this somewhat messy field. Many of the observations that the authors make, sometimes in passing, offer insights into the enterprise of constitutional renewal that ring true and deserve emphasis.' Cheryl Saunders, ICON

What does it mean to say that it is 'We the People' who 'ordain and establish' a constitution? Who are those sovereign people, and how can they do so? Interweaving history and theory, constitutional scholar Chaihark Hahm and political theorist Sung Ho Kim attempt to answer these perennial questions by revisiting the constitutional politics of postwar Japan and Korea. Together, these experiences demonstrate the infeasibility of the conventional assumption that there is a clearly bounded sovereign 'people' prior to constitution-making that stands apart from both outside influence and troubled historical legacies. The authors argue that 'We the People' only emerges through a deeply transformative politics of constitutional founding and, as such, a democratic constitution and its putative author are mutually constitutive. Highly original and genuinely multidisciplinary, this book will be of interest to democratic theorists and scholars of comparative constitutionalism as well as observers of ongoing constitutional debates in Japan and Korea.

Introduction
1. The unbearable lightness of the people
2. War and peace
3. The ghost of empire past
4. A room of one's own
Conclusion.

Subject Areas: Comparative law [LAM], Law [L], Constitution: government & the state [JPHC], Politics & government [JP], Black & Asian studies [JFSL3]