Uploaded March 2026 | Updated September 2026, 1 week ago
This event was organised by the UCL Global Centre for Democratic Constitutionalism.
The Articulated Constitution: Rethinking the State–Society Matrix
Speaker: Dr Ming-Sung Kuo (University of Warwick)
Respondents: Prof Oliver Gerstenberg (UCL Laws), Dr Bernard Keenan (UCL Laws)
Chair: Prof Erin Delaney (UCL Laws)
About the seminar
Defying the dominance of constitutional statism in discussion of governing with a constitution, calls have been made for ‘socializing the constitution’. Yet that societal constitutionalism has emerged as part of the effort to decentre the state in constitutional theory only attests to such statism’s continuing domination of the intellectual landscape of constitutional governance. This image of governance under constitutional statism is refracted. To understand how society finds its place in the project of constitutional governance, this paper takes a close look the state-society matrix that has continued to frame constitutional thinking. Through a two-stage engagement with constitutional theories, I will first provide a four-variety typology of positions on the state-society relationship in the project of constitutional governance – limitation, competition, reflection, and delegation – none of which are satisfactory. Departing from these existing positionings, I will then propose an alternative view of the state-society matrix under which the state and society in constitutional ordering are reflexively articulated to each other. It will argue that the state is not necessarily in tension with society nor is society completely integrated to the state. Articulation underpins the state-society relationship in constitutional governance as a project of freedom.
This seminar was part of the Public Law Seminar Series.
This event was organised by the UCL Global Centre for Democratic Constitutionalism.
The Articulated Constitution: Rethinking the State–Society Matrix
Speaker: Dr Ming-Sung Kuo (University of Warwick)
Respondents: Prof Oliver Gerstenberg (UCL Laws), Dr Bernard Keenan (UCL Laws)
Chair: Prof Erin Delaney (UCL Laws)
About the seminar
Defying the dominance of constitutional statism in discussion of governing with a constitution, calls have been made for ‘socializing the constitution’. Yet that societal constitutionalism has emerged as part of the effort to decentre the state in constitutional theory only attests to such statism’s continuing domination of the intellectual landscape of constitutional governance. This image of governance under constitutional statism is refracted. To understand how society finds its place in the project of constitutional governance, this paper takes a close look the state-society matrix that has continued to frame constitutional thinking. Through a two-stage engagement with constitutional theories, I will first provide a four-variety typology of positions on the state-society relationship in the project of constitutional governance – limitation, competition, reflection, and delegation – none of which are satisfactory. Departing from these existing positionings, I will then propose an alternative view of the state-society matrix under which the state and society in constitutional ordering are reflexively articulated to each other. It will argue that the state is not necessarily in tension with society nor is society completely integrated to the state. Articulation underpins the state-society relationship in constitutional governance as a project of freedom.
This seminar was part of the Public Law Seminar Series.
