Amendment-Metrics. The Good, the Bad and the Frequently Amended Constitution.

Abstract

This paper explores unexpected and precarious uses of the constitutional rigidity level. In doing so, it shall reveal that there is more in the misuse of constitutional amendment rates than meets the eye, and that the stakes may be high when the conclusions drawn aim at offering criteria to constitutional designers. The first part probes why the longstanding question about the economic effects of constitutions appears to have acquired renewed importance and examines the use of empirical methodology and the persuasive capacity of metrics in explaining constitutional change and in setting constitutional design aims. The second part addresses the assertion that long constitutions harm the economy and are thus bad constitutions, as their frequent amendments suggest, pinning down the fallacies underlying such approaches. Different correlations are explored casting doubts on the neutrality of the empirical finding that long constitutions are bad and it is explained why frequent amendments cannot be used as an indicator of bad constitutional quality. The third and final part explains why cutting out words from the Constitution is not a neutral task and explores criteria of constitutional quality.

Keywords: Comparative constitutional change, constitutional quality, leximetrics, constitutional law, empirical constitutionalism