Writing in 1830, the great German philosopher G. W. F. Hegel asserted that ‘what is called “making” a “constitution” is a thing that has never happened in history’. The constitution of a state, he argued, is not merely a set of institutional arrangements but a cultural artefact that ‘develops from the national spirit’. In this traditional understanding, the constitution expresses a nation’s cultur

Recent reforms initiated by both domestic and European developments have led to the codification of many of the rules

without the need for extensive public deliberation

The most powerful driving force of constitutional modernization over the last several decades has been the United Kingdom’s participation in the venture of continuing European integration

By the twenty-first century, there seemed to be a broad-based consensus that Britain’s inherited constitution had come to the end of its useful life.