Video interview with Prof. Tierney: Should the People decide? The Scottish and Catalonian referenda
Video interview with Prof. Stephen Tierney and Prof. Tom Ruys on constitutional referenda, secession, the Scottish and Catalan votes and EU membership.
Key points
In the first BelConLawBlog video interview, recorded after his visit to Ghent on 29 October 2014, Prof. Stephen Tierney (University of Edinburgh) discusses constitutional referenda with Prof. Tom Ruys (Ghent University). They consider the lessons of the Scottish referendum process for secessionist movements, whether peoples or minorities have an inalienable right to hold a referendum, and the relationship between regional independence and EU membership.
On 29 October 2014, we had the honour to welcome renowned expert Prof. Stephen Tierney (University of Edinburgh) in Ghent (view pictures). In this first installment of BelConLawBlog’s video interview series, we invited Prof. Tom Ruys (Ghent University) to discuss the vision of Prof. Tierney regarding constitutional referenda, with a focus on the recent Scottish and Catalonian referenda.
In the interview, both professors talk about the lessons to be drawn from the Scottish referendum process for secessionist agenda’s in Europe and around the world. Furthermore, they explore whether peoples or minorities have an inalienable right to hold a referendum and they analyze the relationship between regional independence and EU-membership.
Stephen Tierney is Professor of Constitutional Theory in the School of Law, University of Edinburgh and Director of the Edinburgh Centre for Constitutional Law. He currently holds an ESRC Senior Research Fellowship to study the referendum process planned for 2014. He served as independent adviser to the Scottish Government on the technical aspects of the referendum for six months in 2012, and in January 2013 was appointed constitutional adviser to the Scottish Parliament’s Referendum (Scotland) Bill Committee. He has published seven books including Constitutional Law and National Pluralism (Oxford University Press, 2004) and Constitutional Referendums: The Theory and Practice of Republican Deliberation, (Oxford University Press, 2012).