Constitutional adjudication and the changing content of public reason: some reflections on Wojciech Sadurski’s Constitutional Public Reason1

Abstract

In Constitutional Public Reason, Wojciech Sadurski contributes to our understanding of constitutional liberal democracy by bringing together public reason, constitutional theory, and detailed constitutional law in a powerful and productive way. Sadurski’s account of public reason, one that is in many important respects different from John Rawls’s own account, correctly recognises the mutability of the content of public reason. I argue that the recognition of the mutability of the content of public reason, however, puts pressure on Sadurski’s characterisation of the relationship between courts and public reason.