Textualizing Democracy: The Norwegian Constitution 1814-2014

The specific interdisciplinary and textual focus on the Constitution will allow us to explore new ways of analyzing citizens' participation in the evolution of democracy in Norway. Relying on methodologies that share an understanding of texts as social ac tions, we focus on investigating the textual processes involved in the creation of the Norwegian Constitution and its various transformations and interpretations during the last two centuries. A significant part of this investigation is to consider how th e Constitution has evolved as a continuous dialogue with texts relating to international events in that period. The focus on the textual qualities of the Constitution helps us scrutinize both its complex prehistory and its history of changes and interpret ations. The textual focus enables us to reveal citizens' actions and decisions on a micro-level, and to follow closely diachronic and transnational transformations. Our project moves beyond mono-disciplinary approaches to the Norwegian Constitution to fus e knowledge generated in our respective realms of expertise and to expand research of the Constitution into textual research. We plan to disseminate our research as an academic book published by an international publisher. Chapters in the book will appro ach several interrelated dimensions of the Norwegian Constitution as a text: textual culture 1814 in Denmark-Norway, the writing down of constitutional texts, Article 100 and the past, temporal inscriptions, the 1814 understanding of 'constitution', textu al connectives, constitutional intertextuality, the power of genre, British reflections, a comparison with the US experience, judicial and political codes, facilitation of public discourse, amendments as text changes, parliamentarians on the language of t he Constitution, and young students' interpretations. The involved researchers have their background in Law, Social Sciences, the Humanities and Education. The research team includes three international scholars.