Presidential Constitutional Conventions

Abstract

Constitutional conventions naturally and gradually emerge overtime alongside formal (constitutional and legal) provisions. Unlike (constitutional) law, political science literature has so far paid little attention to constitutional conventions, although these informal rules may (and in fact do) significantly affect the constitutional practice of most of the democratic states. Hence, studying constitutional conventions is vital for our understanding of how constitutional systems actually work, as relying on only formal rules might give us an incomplete or even misleading picture of the constitutional systems. The panel papers focus on those constitutional conventions that are directly tied to presidents of states in various European democracies. For the purposes of this panel, the presidential constitutional conventions can be generally defined as mostly unwritten, politics-originated rules that are generally binding and that regulate and structure the behavior of constitutional actors in specific situations closely related to the president of state and affecting the operation of constitutional systems. Not only firmly established constitutional conventions, but also emerging conventions and other repeatedly followed rules that may trigger debates about constitutional conventions can be covered by the papers.

Title	Details
Experts on Constitutional Conventions in Visegrad Group Countries	View Paper Details
Presidential powers in Hungary: convention, tradition, and informal constitutional change	View Paper Details
Shaping the appointment powers of the Slovak president under constitutional conventions	View Paper Details