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4 Potchefstroom Elec. L.J. 1 (2001)

handle is hein.journals/per2001 and id is 1 raw text is: UTILIZING CONSTITUTIONAL VALUES IN CONSTITUTIONAL COMPARISON Francois Venter 1. Constitutional comparison We are living in an era in which constitutional law has become a comparative science. This is not true only for developing constitutional states, but for the constitutional law of all constitutional states. The reason for this is that the history of modem constitutionalism has reached a global fullness of development, from which emanates a distinct set of commonalities, principles, standards and values that have gained currency in constitutional dialogue all over the world. Perhaps the best proof of this ripeness of constitutionalism is to be found in the signs that new, postmodem thinking about the state, the law and the sustainability of the established tenets of constitutionalism is pushing at the gates of globally received constitutional doctrine.1 Despite this push for a postmodem replacement of modernist constitutional thinking, which is essentially the product of Euro-American thinking over many centuries, the contemporary constitutionalist inevitably continues to operate with this product. It entails constitutionally enshrined values, entrenched fundamental rights, judicial review, the separation of powers, democratic processes, etc. Exactly because these and similar constitutional notions share a multi-national history and universal acceptance as standards for sound constitutional structuring, the constitutional lawyer cannot but be a comparatist. The practice of constitutional comparison has become the norm in some, especially European, jurisdictions. There are however many jurisdictions where this is not the case and where the basic principles of the comparative practice are not well known. It is therefore worth the exercise to briefly 2 introduce some of these principles before proceeding. 1 Cf Venter 257-262 2 The approach to constitutional comparison followed here, is more extensively dealt with in Venter F Constitutional Comparison (Juta and Kluwer Cape Town, Cambridge (MA) and Dordrecht 2000) Chapter 1.

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