The decisive, limited, and normative nature of constituent power—The transformations of Emmanuel Joseph Sieyès’s revolutionary roles and evolution of his theory of constituent power

The questions of whether the right to draft a constitution is decisive or normative and whether it should be included in the study of constitutional law have often led to widely differing or even completely opposing conclusions among scholars in China and around the world. At the same time, they often project related arguments onto Emmanuel Joseph Sieyès’s understanding of the theory of constituent power. Some cite Qu’est-ce que le Tiers-État? (What is the third estate?) to demonstrate the decisive properties of constituent power, and some use the example of his Jurie Constitutionnaire to emphasize the normative properties of constituent power. However, very few people point out that Sieyès continually adjusted his own role and position as the revolution changed and the revolution’s goals transformed. We can divide the roles that Sieyès played on the eve of the revolution, during the constitutional convention, and in 1795 into revolutionary, constitutional author, and a constitutional amender and analyze the evolution of his thinking on constitutional drafting from this angle. On the whole, there is an indivisible connection among the decisive, limited, and normative aspects of Sieyès’s theory of constituent power and the transformations of the roles he actually played

Evolutionary theory · Normative · Power (physics) · Subject (documents) · European Political History Analysis · French Historical and Cultural Studies · Political Theory and Influence