ITL, chapter 8

The branch of law that regulates the state itself.

1) Constitution: a central written document where constitutional rules have been laid down.

2) Case law: when courts lay down rules with a constitutional focus.

3) Customs: 

4) Entrenchment: a meant to make change in the constitution harder to accomplish than changes in ordinary law.

1) State power established

2) State power constrained

3) State power democratized 

A state is an organization that is able to control a certain territory and the people living in it.

Both in the sense of defending it against the outside world and in the sense of exercising powers and maintaining law and order inside its own border.

Internal and external sovereignty.

It is exercising powers and maintaining law and order inside its own border.

the mutual relation between states.

A sovereign state is independent of other states and other states are normally not authorised to interfere into internal affairs of a sovereign state.

When people share common characteristics and have a (long) common history, it gives them a feeling of a shared past and an identity. Such a group of people is called a nation.

When a state is inhabited by such a nation, it is called state-nation.

Where such unifying factors do not exist spontaneously, states can make an effort to create more unity.