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26 - Emergency Powers

from Part II - Modalities

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 March 2025

By
Karin Loevy
Edited by
Richard Bellamy  and
Jeff King
Richard Bellamy
Affiliation:
University College London
Jeff King
Affiliation:
University College London
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Summary

Rather than occasions for law’s standstill in face of a political decision, emergencies are opportunities for legal, institutional and normative mobilization. The entry lays out the field’s basic areas of concern: the theoretical problem of containment of threats within a particular legal and political order, and the practical problems of definitions, authorizations, jurisdiction and temporality. If indeed the time frames of emergency are long and flexible, multiple and overlapping rather than “exceptional”, then law in emergencies is a constantly shifting space of opportunity in which normatively charged political projects can be manifested. To design legal and constitutional mechanisms that will better respond to threats, we should shift away from theories that perpetuate a static dichotomy between “norm” and “exception”, and study emergency as a dynamic field of legal and normative mobilization.

Keywords

emergenciesemergency powers“exception”authorizationjurisdictiontemporality
Type
Chapter
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The Cambridge Handbook of Constitutional Theory , pp. 433 - 450
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2025

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References

Recommended Reading

Agamben, G. (1998). Homo Sacre: Sovereign Power and Bare Life. Translated by D. Heller-Roazen. Redwood City, CA: Stanford University Press.Google Scholar
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  • Emergency Powers
  • Edited by Richard Bellamy, University College London, Jeff King, University College London
  • Book: The Cambridge Handbook of Constitutional Theory
  • Online publication: 27 March 2025
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/9781108868143.029
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  • Emergency Powers
  • Edited by Richard Bellamy, University College London, Jeff King, University College London
  • Book: The Cambridge Handbook of Constitutional Theory
  • Online publication: 27 March 2025
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/9781108868143.029
Available formats
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Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

  • Emergency Powers
  • Edited by Richard Bellamy, University College London, Jeff King, University College London
  • Book: The Cambridge Handbook of Constitutional Theory
  • Online publication: 27 March 2025
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/9781108868143.029
Available formats
×