Pravar’s main academic research interests include constituent power theory, the nature of unwritten constitutional limits, and constitutional legitimacy.
His doctoral thesis was titled ‘Situating the People: The Place of Constituent Power in the UK Constitution’. Drawing on theories of sovereignty and and an account of constitutional legitimacy rooted in Bernard Williams’ political philosophy, it argues that expressions of constituent power through referendums and the devolution settlements of the UK impose non-legal constitutional constraints on the UK Parliament’s legislative authority. He received the Modern Law Review Scholarship for the 2022-23 and 2023-24 academic years.
He is currently working on three issues:
- An account of the utility of constituent power theory in explaining the unaddressed constitutional implications of referendums in the UK;
- An exploration of regenerative and complex life-systems thinking as a meta-theory for understanding constitutional time and constitutional repair;
- A standalone account of how constituent authority acts as an unwritten constitutional limit through the dynamics of constitutional legitimacy.
Pravar has presented his research at a variety of conferences and workshops, including at University College Dublin, at the SLSA Conference 2023 (Ulster University), the University of Liverpool, Durham University, the Public Law Conference 2024 (uOttawa) and the University of Edinburgh.
A full list of Pravar’s academic and policy publications can be found here.
Pravar Petkar 