Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Wisconsin--Madison, 1922. / eContent provider-neutral record in process. Description based on print version record. Includes bibliographical references and index.

Thesis (M.A.)--University of Leicester in association with University of Hong Kong, 1996. / Includes bibliographical references. Also available in print.

Racism has been perpetuated in America since slavery. Central to this notion is the United States’ history of racism perpetuated via its political system which subjected minorities - African-Americans in particular - to the oppressive wrath of governmental policies for centuries. As the country grew more intolerant of slavery, the Civil War lead to the Reconstruction Amendments which abolished slavery and intended to give African-Americans an opportunity to exercise new civil and political rights. The opponents of Reconstruction, particularly from the Deep South, were ideologically opposed to these changes and sought to encumber blacks by targeting their right to the franchise. Racial discrimination in politics took the guise of literacy tests and other excessive measures. The era of postbellum segregation and racially discriminatory legislation ensured that blacks and other minorities would not be given the equal treatment they had been denied since slavery. Slavery was over, but racism persisted. By the hands of southern state legislatures, discrimination evolved, as African-Americans would face extensive impediments in exercising their right to vote for over a century. But as the mid-20th Century Civil Rights Movement gained steam, Congress passed the Voting Rights Act (VRA) in 1965 with the hope of finally putting an end to this effective discrimination. The most polarizing facet of the VRA was the section 5 “preclearance” provision because it treated states differently; it was buttressed by the section 4 “coverage formula” which designated which states would be subject to this differential treatment; while the section 3 provisions established a constitutional safety valve emboldening the more vulnerable facets of the legislation. The VRA was momentous in reducing voting rights infringement aimed at minorities. Yet today, that legislation is no more. The Court’s decision in Shelby County v. Holder (2013) provides a simplistic appraisal of the VRA. Exhibiting dubious jurisprudence illuminated through examination of an earlier case, Northwest Austin Municipal Utility District No. 1 v. Holder (2009), Robert’s opinion undermines the values personified by the Reconstruction Amendments and leaves the nation’s protection of the franchise more vulnerable to backsliding than it has been for decades.

For centuries South Africa has been embroiled in racial conflict with human rights as one of the tragic casualties. With the adoption of the lnterim and Final Constitutions a decisive break was made with the past. One of the foundations laid to forge our new society based on equality and human dignity was the adoption of a Bill of Rights. Embodied in the clauses of the Bill of Rights are the values by which the people should guide their conduct in the future.

Includes bibliographical references. / It is not simply enough to have a separation of powers written on paper. In this paper I shall look at the pragmatic approach adopted by the Constitutional Court when adjudicating upon executive and legislative power in order to ensure its institutional security and legitimacy. I shall evaluate throughout this paper how the lack of sufficiently and consistently formulating and articulating principles that guide the Constitutional Court’s own limits could actually undermine the Court’s legitimacy in our current political climate.

The South African Constitution explicitly guarantees the right of access to housing (section 26 of the Constitution). To consider whether the state has fulfilled its positive obligations to take appropriate steps to realise the right of access to housing within its available resources, the Constitutional Court – based on the text of the provision 26(2) of the Constitution – uses the test of reasonableness. Contrary to the minimum core concept, which was developed through the General Comments of the United Nations Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights and which is used to measure state actions in regard of the right to housing under Article 11 para 1 of the ICESCR, the reasonableness approach shifts the emphasis from the reasonableness of the solution to the reasonableness of the steps taken, moving away from a substantive right towards administrative oversight, which makes – so the assumption goes – the constitutional right of access to housing effectively meaningless. However, in this dissertation it is argued that it is not the reasonableness approach per se which hinders the implementation of the right of access to housing but rather the choice of remedy and the lack of (individual) access to the Court. In doing so, this study will show that the Court by using the reasonableness approach is acting in accordance with the wording and the transformative character of the South African Constitution and its own institutional role within the constitutional framework based on the separation of powers. Subsequently the study demonstrates that the effectiveness of the right of access to housing depends on the remedy granted by the Court and the possibility of access to the Court rather than the approach reverted to by the Court. Against this backdrop, the dissertation scrutinises what can be done to expand access to justice for claims flowing from the right of access to housing and thus to facilitate the right.

Thesis (doctoral)--Universität Konstanz, 1998. / Includes bibliographical references.

Inaug.-dis.--Strassburg. / "Uebersicht der citierten litteratur": p.[vii]-xiii.

No description available.

Zimbabwe adopted the Lancaster Constitution in 1980. This constitution has been amended a record nineteen times. The critic on some of the amendments is that they have undermined the fundamental tenets of constitutionalism. Therefore, in the light of the fact that the tide of constitutionalism is sweeping throughout Africa, the dissertation critically evaluates the extent to which the Lancaster Constitution subsumes the basic tenets of constitutionalism. This evaluation is precipitated by the fact that Zimbabwe is currently grappling with drafting a new Constitution. Through this evaluation the inescapable conclusion is that the Lancaster Constitution merely provides a veneer of constitutionalism. Drawing from the constitutional experience of Anglophone African countries which include Botswana, Ghana, Lesotho, Malawi, Namibia, South Africa and Zambia; the dissertation offers some reforms which the drafters of the new constitution could include in the envisaged constitution. It is argued that it is only after a constitution embodies the identified fundamental tenets of constitutionalism that it becomes worth the paper it is written on. / Thesis (LL.M.)-University of KwaZulu-Natal, Durban, 2013.