[P2P-F] Fwd: Constitute - Tool for Designing Constitutions

Wed Sep 25 02:31:02 CEST 2013

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Dante-Gabryell Monson <dante.monson at gmail.com>
Date: Tue, Sep 24, 2013 at 5:55 PM
Subject: Constitute - Tool for Designing Constitutions
To: "econowmix at googlegroups.com" <econowmix at googlegroups.com>

found via Seth

https://www.constituteproject.org

http://www.theverge.com/2013/9/23/4761922/google-launches-constitute-a-new-tool-for-designing-governments

The process of drafting a constitution is usually long, intricate and
politically fraught — but with 160 different active constitutions to draw
from, it's also uniquely amenable to data analysis. With that in mind,
Google has partnered with the Comparative Constitutions Project to launch a
new site called Constitute <https://www.constituteproject.org/>, devoted to
comparing the world's constitutions. It examines nearly 350 constitutional
themes, organized into topics like the duties of a citizen and the role of
the executive. The result is a comprehensive view of how countries
structure their governments, and a powerful tool for any would-be founders.
As one co-founder put it, "If want to see what African constitutions have
to say about the rights of women after 1945, you can do that in just a few
clicks."

"Our aim is to arm drafters with a better tool for constitution design and
writing," Google said in a post accompanying the
launch<http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2013/09/explore-worlds-constitutions-with-new.html>.
That's a niche audience, to put it mildly, but it's also an important one.
In 2013 so far, Zimbabwe has already voted on a new
constitution<http://www.nytimes.com/2013/03/17/world/africa/zimbabwe-votes-on-new-constitution.html>,
and 2012 saw both Somalia and Syria adopt new founding documents, along
with nearly half a dozen revisions from other countries. The hope is that,
if Constitute can influence the next generation of constitutions and give
citizens a greater sense of ownership over the documents, it could have a
huge impact in years to come.

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