Why Does United Kingdome Has No Written Constitution?

654 Words3 Pages
Constitution is the body of doctrines and practices that form the fundamental organizing principle of a political state. It is the backbone of every state's government but United Kingdom begs to differ. It is quite unusual and amazing at the same time that UK has no single legal binding document to set out the fundamental laws of how the state will be governed. UK has proved there is no need for a codified constitution for a country to be run - some people even say UK has one of the most successful constitutions in the world so being a stable country for long does not really have anything to do with a codified constitution. So, why UK doesn't have a codified constitution? There are many reasons for that. Britain’s lack of a ‘written’ constitution can be explained by its history. In other countries, many of which have experienced revolution or regime change, it has been necessary to start from scratch or begin from first principles, constructing new state institutions and defining in detail their relations with each other and their citizens. America has got it's constitution codified in the 18th century after getting its independence. France created its constitution after their revolution, post Soviet countries created their constitution after the Union was collapsed so they needed a new constitution to completely change from the communist system of Soviet to democratic capitalist countries. Philippines changed its constitution 3 times even. UK never had such big revolutions, which had swept much of the European continent in the 19th century. Thus there never has been a need for a constitution. United Kingdom has been building gradually on common laws, case laws, historical documents, Acts of parliament and European legislation. It is not enclosed clearly in any one document. Thus, it is more accurate to refer to Britain’s constitution as an ‘uncodified’
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