Comparative Constitutions Project

The Comparative Constitutions Project (CCP) was launched in 2005 to explore the origins and consequences of constitutional choices. Directed by Zachary Elkins and Tom Ginsburg, CCP produces comprehensive data about the world’s constitutions, tracking the characteristics of current and historical written constitutions for most independent states dating back to 1789. While CCP started as an effort to understand how constitutions work, it has grown into an effort to change how they work, or rather, how we use them. CCP indexes the topics in constitutional texts on our platform Constitute (www.constituteproject.org). The platform serves as a resource for constitution drafters and citizens to explore varied approaches to drafting topics and to inform constitutional design around the world, drawing some 10,000 unique visitors every day. The site contains the full text, indexed with CCP topics, for nearly every active national constitution in the world. In addition to browsing 300+ topics tagged by CCP, users can run their own searches, sort results by region or time period, and pin content for further analysis. CCP also provides technical assistance and tools to support ongoing constitutional processes. This includes working with governments to develop tools to support constitution drafting processes like the Comparador de Constituciones del Mundo in Chile (https://tinyurl.com/52uv3m5u). This also includes making draft constitutions and comparison tools available for the public to analyze proposed drafts in real time (https://tinyurl.com/mwf385y5).