ABSTRACT
The British polity has witnessed major changes in recent years. The con-stitutional and political landscape of Britain looks very different at thestart of the twenty-first century from that which existed for most of the twentieth. It is impossible not to be struck by the extent of the change. Writing in 2002 of constitutional change in the period from 1970 to 2000, Robert Stevens said that it “provided a practical and psychological transformation” comparable to the constitutional revolution wrought in the period from 1640 to 1720.1 There had been major changes to the nation’s constitutional arrangements in the intervening years, but “they were essentially independent acts rather than part of a dramatic period of constitutional restructuring.”2 The “restructuring” of recent years has continued. The British constitution has been characterized as unsettled. 3 Professor Anthony King has described it as “a mess.”4 How then to give some shape to what has happened? And what for the future?
