Includes index.

Introduction : The First-Period Problem of Constitutional Implementation / Tom Ginsburg and Aziz Z. Huq -- Looking "Backward" or "Forward" to American Constitutional Development : -- Reflections on Constitutional "Endurance" and "Adaptation" in the "First Republic" / Sanford Levinson -- Marking Constitutional Transitions : The Law and Politics of Constitutional -- Implementation in South Africa / Rosalind Dixon and Theunis Roux -- India's First Period : Constitutional Doctrine and Constitutional Stability / -- Madhav Khosla -- Two Steps "Forward", One Step "Back"? : Transformation and Correction in the Implementation of Ecuador's 2008 Constitution / Eric Alston -- The Long Road Ahead : The First Period of a Gender-Responsive Constitution in Zimbabwe / Claudia Flores -- Constitutional Reform and Women's Political Participation : Electoral Gender -- Quotas in Post-Arab Spring Egypt, Tunisia, and Jordan / Susan H. Williams -- Explaining the Institutional Role of the Colombian Constitutional Court / -- Diego González -- Implementing a New Constitution in a Competitive Authoritarian Context : The Case of Kenya / James Thuo Gathii -- Transformational Authoritarian Constitutions : The Case of Chile / -- Tom Ginsburg -- Authoritarian Straitjacket or Vehicle for Democratic Transition? : The Risky -- Struggle to Change Myanmar's Constitution / Melissa Crouch -- The Ethiopian Constitution and Ethnic Federalism / Daniel Abebe

"This book concerns a set of problems that arise from the distinctive conceptual and practical tension in the first period after a new constitution has been adopted. We shall argue that at a very general level, a new constitution must manage a balance or tension between two forces. These are aspirations for transformation and demands for preservation through entrenchment. The first period, as we will elaborate, is the conceptual, temporal, and institutional bridge between the past and future. It is the moment when the transformative and the preservative vectors of constitutional design can come into the sharpest conflict. The variable nature of these conflicts-and the diverse means through which they are mediated, whether successfully or less successfully-is the focus of both this introduction and, in different ways, the chapters that follow"--