ABSTRACT
Although this symposium has treated the subject of the Bill of Rights in the welfare state primarily within the context of American constitutionallaw, it is instructive and appropriate to compare the American experience with the experiences of other liberal democratic welfare states. Indeed, if a symposium on this subject had been held in 1991 at a university anywhere except in the United States, its approach almost certainly would have been cross-national from beginning to end. Most of the participants, no doubt, would have been invited to explore how some countries-for exampIe, Canada, Denmark, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Norway, and Sweden-have managed, more or less successfully, to remain simultaneously committed to political and civil rights, a well-developed welfare state, and a system of constitutional control of legislative and executive action. There would probably have been a session or two devoted to the transition of the East European countries from socialism to constitutional social democracy. Another major topic would have been how commitments made in international human rights instruments have affected national legal systems. Finally, in a11 likelihood, there would have been sessions devoted to two special cases: first, England, a welfare state without a system of judicial review or a bill of rights (in the modern sense); and second, the United States, a country with a venerable rights tradition and a strong system of judicial review, but with a minimalist welfare state.
