Gosseries, Axel; Hungerbühler, Mathias --- "Rule change and intergenerational justice" [2006] ELECD 483; in Tremmel, Chet Joerg (ed), "Handbook of Intergenerational Justice" (Edward Elgar Publishing, 2006)

Book Title: Handbook of Intergenerational Justice

Editor(s): Tremmel, Chet Joerg

Publisher: Edward Elgar Publishing

ISBN (hard cover): 9781845429003

Section: Chapter 6

Section Title: Rule change and intergenerational justice

Author(s): Gosseries, Axel; Hungerbühler, Mathias

Extract:

6 Rule change and intergenerational justice
Axel Gosseries and Mathias Hungerbühler


Introduction
Constitutions have attracted the attention of intergenerational justice
specialists for at least two reasons. Activists have defended the need for con-
stitutionalizing the rights of future generations (see Tremmel in this
volume). And theorists have stressed the problematic nature of constitu-
tions insofar as their rigidity allows earlier generations to impose rules that
later ones may otherwise not have chosen (see Jefferson 1789; Holmes 1995,
ch. 5; Otsuka 2003, ch. 7). Examples include requirements of qualified
majority to modify constitutional provisions or the introduction of restric-
tions such that provisions could only be revised by a legislature if they were
included in a list by the previous legislature. Such mechanisms are at times
a solution (for example for those who want it to be hard to question a
concern for future generations that would already be embodied in a con-
stitution) and at other times a problem (insofar as generations may disagree
with each other on constitutional matters). Constitutional rigidity is thus a
double-edged sword from the perspective of intergenerational justice.
In contrast to constitutional rigidity, rule change ­ including constitu-
tional change ­ has not attracted much attention, be it from philosophers in
general (see the following exceptions: Campbell 1973; Fried 2003; Murphy
and Nagel 2002, pp. 128­129) or from those concerned with intergener-
ational justice in particular. People make choices on the basis of expecta-
tions regarding the degree of stability of legal rules (for ...