CONSTITUTIONAL REFORM IN THE SYSTEM OF SOCIAL AND LEGAL TRANSFORMATIONS

Abstract

The article examines constitutional reform as a complex, multidimensional political and legal phenomenon and determines its place in the system of social and legal transformations. The relevance of the topic is due to the need to theoretically distinguish law reform from other types of social change, as well as to the absence in contemporary Ukrainian constitutional law scholarship of a unified approach to understanding the nature, features, and functional purpose of constitutional reform. It is established that constitutional reform should not be reduced solely to the adoption of a new Constitution or amendments to the current Basic Law. It should be understood more broadly as a process of substantial renewal of the constitutional foundations of the social and state order, the mechanism of public power, constitutional legal relations, constitutional legal consciousness, and the means of ensuring constitutional legality and constitutional order. The article summarizes the main doctrinal approaches to understanding constitutional reform, in particular the procedural-textual, institutional-organizational, and systemic constitutionalist approaches. It is substantiated that within the system of constitutional changes, constitutional reform is one of the forms of constitutional change and should be distinguished from constitutional modernization and constitutional transformation. It is proved that constitutional modernization is mainly associated with the evolutionary improvement of the functioning of the constitutional system without a radical change in the model of constitutionalism, whereas constitutional transformation reflects a broader dynamic and functional-practical dimension of the development of both the legal and the real constitution. Particular attention is paid to the relationship between constitutional reform, constitutional law reform, and law reform. It is concluded that constitutional reform is not synonymous with political, administrative, or public administration reforms and should not be unjustifiably identified with parliamentary or judicial reforms. The author argues that constitutional reform is a key component of constitutional law reform as a sectoral type of law reform and, at the same time, serves as the normative-value, methodological, and legitimizing basis for broader legal transformations.