Can the Knesset dissolve itself during recess?
On July 28, 2024, the 25th Knesset entered the longest recess in its history amidst an ongoing military conflict and complex political challenges. This unprecedented situation brought to the forefront the urgent and hypothetical question of whether opposition factions in the Knesset could initiate the dissolution of the Knesset, topple the government, and return the mandate to the people. While the High Court of Justice ruling in Frij restricts convening the Knesset during recess to urgent government matters, private bills aimed at dissolving the Knesset should be an exception under certain constitutional conditions.
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Proactive International Law
In this blog post we challenge the reactive nature of international law, a discipline that has largely developed in response to specific crises and incidents, such as wars, pandemics, mass migrations, economic breakdowns, or technological advancements. While we acknowledge that the reactive paradigm of international law has facilitated adoption of pragmatic solutions to the concrete problems encountered and offered international law a path by which to direct its development, this approach, we contend, has led international law to be backward-looking, short-sighted, and ill-prepared to address newly emerging global threats and advances.
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Extra-Constitutional Commitment Mechanisms
The solution to many public dilemmas requires long-term effort by successive generations. Such situation arises whenever the solution to a public dilemma cannot be implemented instantaneously but is dependent on the continuous effort of future governments (and their citizens). In this post I discuss the problem of securing intergenerational cooperation, focusing on the challenge of designing long-term commitment mechanisms. I will also reflect briefly on the tension between commitment mechanisms and the democratic ideal of citizen sovereignty (allowing each generation to make its own choices).
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