A Universalist History of the 1987 Philippine Constitution (I)

This paper traces universalism --- the vision of international public order built upon rights and values shared by all individuals and peoples --- as a purposely-embedded ideology in the history and evolution of the Philippine Constitution.  As the postcolonial and post-dictatorship founding document of the post-modern Philippine polity, the paper contends that 1987 Philippine Constitution enshrines nearly a century of constitutional text and practice which has led towards the present institutionalization of universalist rights-democratic theory in the Philippines’ constitutional interpretive canon. Submission date: 04/10/2008 Acceptance date: 19/12/2008