Kurzus nemzetközi vendég- és részidős hallgatóknak

Kar

Bölcsészettudományi Kar

Szervezet

BTK Amerikanisztika Tanszék

Kód

BBI-AME-121E

Cím

Angolszász politikai kultúra

Tervezett félév

Őszi

Meghirdetve

2023/24/2, 2024/25/1

ECTS

3

Nyelv

en

Leírás

Code for non-international students start with BBN

Oktatás célja

Frequently using comparative methods, the course adopts a constitutional-legal, historical, and current political analysis approach to the introduction of the traditions and practices of governance in the United Kingdom, the Commonwealth and the United States of America. This combination of approaches is intended to familiarise students with the spirit and everyday practice of British and American constitutional government and also to introduce a certain degree of theoretical interpretation. The latter may also be applied by students to countries and social environments other than the Anglo-American context in which they studied it.

Tantárgy tartalma

Here is a syllabus of subject-matters that the lectures will address together with the core as well as recommended literature. 1. Citizenship studies. The crisis of participatory, popular, democracy in Europe and the United States. Why constitutions matter. Where does a constitution 'reside'? The rule of law. What is a Civil Society and how has it evolved historically? Montesquieu’s De l'esprit des lois, 1748. 2. Custom, Convention, Usage and Community, the State and the Law: the European experience in Legal Codes, traditions and Constitutional Development. The language of laws and constitutions. The origins and nature of the English Common Law and Statute Law. 3. The Executive, Legislature and Judiciary. What are the Three Branches of Government? Why may they need to be separated? Montesquieu’s tripartite system: The Monarch, Parliament, Courts of Law. 4. The Nature of the British Constitution: Historical, uncodified. Its sources: statutes, documents, customs, conventions. The indeterminate, indistinct and unentrenched character of the British Constitution. Cabinet government. 5. Writers on the British Constitution I: Blackstone, Hallam, De Lolme, Dicey, Maitland. 6. Territory, population, citizenship, sovereignty, Church and State, treaty making in the British Constitution. 7. Writers on the British Constitution II: Bagehot, Ivor Jennings and Vernon Bogdanor 8. The separation of powers as a customary practice. The system of checks and balances. The Executive, the Legislature and the Judiciary in England and Wales. Gradually receding overlaps. A new British Constitution? 9. Comparing Presidential and Parliamentary systems. Subjects, citizens and the state. 'Adversarial Cohabitation' between the Executive and Congress in the United States. 10. The Constitution of the United States of America I: Origins. The Articles of Confederation and Perpetual Union. The Annapolis Convention, 1786. The Philadelphia Constitutional Convention, ratification. Influence of the Iroquois Confederation, of French authors, Greek, Roman antiquity and of the Enlightenment, of the English Common Law and Statute Law. The importance of case law. 11. The Constitution of the United States of America II: The text, its close reading and interpretation. The Presidency, Congress and the Supreme Court. How have they been affected by historical change? Case law that changed the Constitution and/or its application. 12. The first Ten Amendments: The Bill of Rights. Subsequent Amendments, Unratified amendments. How has the American Civil War, the First World War, the New Deal period, the Vietnam War and the American Civil Rights movement affected the Constitution, Constitutional interpretations and practice? Further case law that changed the Constitution and/or its application. 13. Judicial Review, The Supreme Court, Critique of the American Constitution. Recent developments that reflect on interpretations of the Constitution: the wars of George W. Bush and Barack Obama's healthcare reform. 14. America in Decay?

Számonkérés és értékelés

A multiple choice examination test, consisting of 30 questions, will determine the mark at the end of the semester.

Irodalomjegyzék

Part I, Basic Textbooks Bagehot, Walter. The English Constitution, 1867, 1872. Bogdanor, Vernon, ed. The British Constitution in the Twentieth Century, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2003. Finer, S.E., Vernon Bogdanor and Bernard Rudden. Comparing Constitutions, Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1995. Janda, Kenneth; Jeffrey M. Barry and Jerry Goldman. The Challenge of Democracy: Government in America, 11th edition, e-book, Boston: Wadsworth, Cengage Learning, 2011. Part II, Other textbooks Allison, J.W.F. The English Historical Constitution: Continuity, Change and European Effects, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007. Bogdanor, Vernon. The New British Constitution, Oxford: Hart, 2009. Bogdanor, Vernon. The Coalition and the Constitution, Oxford and Portland, Oregon: Hart Publishing, 2011. Bryant, Chris. Parliament: The Biography. Volume 2: Reform, London: Doubleday, 2014. Chemerinsky, Erwin. Constitutional Law: principles and policies, 3rd edition, New York, NY: Aspen Publishers, 2006. “The Cabinet Manual – Draft. A guide to laws, conventions and rules on the operation of government”, London: The British Cabinet Office, December 2010. Kelly, Alfred Hinsey and Wilfred Audif Harbison. The American Constitution: its origins and development, 5th edition, New York: Norton, 1976. Laws, David. 22 Days in May: the birth of the first Lib-Dem-Conservative Coalition, London: Biteback, 2010. McLaughlin, Andrew Cunningham. The Confederation and the Constitution 1783-1789, New York: Collier Books, 1965. Mansfield, Harvey Claflin. America's Constitutional Soul, Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1991. Otte, T.G. and Jeremy Black eds, Coalition Government in British Politics: From Glorious Revolution to Cameron-Clegg, London: The Social Affairs Unit, 2011. Rosenfeld, Michael and András Sajó eds. The Oxford Handbook of Comparative Constitutional Law, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2012. Warren, Charles. The Making of the Constitution, New York: Barnes and Noble, 1967. ––––– Part III, Constitutional Authors as Sources. To be studied selectively and independently. Blackstone, William. Commentaries on the Laws of England, 1765. De Lolme, Jean-Louis. The Constitution of England: Or, an Account of the English Government, 1771. De Tocqueville, Alexis. Democracy in America, 1835. Dicey, A.V. An Introduction to the Study of the Law of the Constitution, 1885. Hallam, Henry. The Constitutional History of England from the Accession of Henry VII to the Death of George II, 1827. Hallam, Henry. The Constitutional History of England from Edward I to Henry VII, 1873. Jennings, W. Ivor. Cabinet Government, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1936. Jennings, W. Ivor. The Law of the Constitution, 3rd edition, London: University of London Press Ltd., 1943. Maitland, F. W. The Constitutional History of England, edited by H.A.L. Fisher, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1908. Petit-Dutaillis, Charles. Studies and Notes Supplementary to Stubbs'’s Constitutional History, 2 volumes, 2nd edition, Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1914. Pollard, A.F. The Evolution of Parliament, London: Longmans, Green and Co., 1920. Stubbs, William. The Constitutional History of England in Its Origin and Development, Oxford: The Clarendon Press, 3 volumes, 1875-78.

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