ABSTRACT
A constitution is often understood in narrow terms as a written document that defines the basic institutions of a state and the scope of its powers. In its broader, democratic sense, constitution also refers to the act of constituting the state by a people. As such, a constitution includes not only the order that is constituted but the identity of the citizens who authorize it. Every written constitution thus presupposes an irreducibly political dimension that refers back to what the citizens of a polity have in common. According this broad political sense of the constitution, we can recognize constitutional politics in any claim that contests or re-inscribes what the citizens of a polity have (or ought to have) in common and what the terms of their political association are (or ought to be).
