Judicial Review in New Democracies: Constitutional Courts in Asian Cases

Constitutionalism has swept the world in the last one or two decades. Judicial review has become a popular and accepted constitutional institution along the way. By now, most countries in East Asia have adopted judicial review modeled on either the American or European system, or a mixture of both. Although various systems of judicial review have begun playing important functions in many constitutional regimes, the questions of why judicial review would be created and how it may function particularly in the context of East Asia remains to be answered fully. Professor Tom Ginsburg's book entitled Judicial Review in New Democracies: Constitutional Court in Asian Cases"1 was among the first attempts at inquiring such questions and even more importantly, putting them into the East Asian context. The College of Law, National Taiwan University is honored to have Professor Ginsburg to give his lecture on this very topic and to have many distinguished professors within and beyond Taiwan to join in the roundtable. It is hoped that this roundtable discussion may shed the light on positive explanations for the institution of judicial review and provide for thoughtful examinations and updates on judicial review developments in East Asia, particularly in Japan, South Korea and Taiwan.