Constitutional Statecraft in Asian Courts by Yvonne Tew. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2020. 272 pp. Hardcover: £80.00.

Abstract

Yvonne Tew ’ s Constitutional Statecraft in Asian Courts is a careful and detailed study of constitutionalism in Malaysia and Singapore. The book combines history, theory, and practice to offer a nuanced account of how judicial power has evolved in both countries and provides a framework for how it can be harnessed further in the service of constitutional democracy. The book begins with a theoretical section that overviews the major literature in this area. 1 Tew is critical – rightly so – of categorical statements about the nature of judicial power and of constitutional rights. She helpfully deconstructs and critiques several dichotomies including the universal versus relativist conceptions of human rights, which was prominent in the ‘ Asian values ’ debate of the 1980s and 1990s, and still has resonances today. 2 This is the idea, advanced by Lee Kuan Yew and Mahathir Mohammad, among others, that Asian cultures place higher value on commu-nity and social order than on ‘ Western ’ notions of individual liberty. 3 In addition to essentialising the values of a large and diverse continent, Tew points out that ‘ Asian values ’ is susceptible to ideo-logical capture, particularly in the context of justifying the policies of authoritarian regimes. 4 Tew is also skeptical of the dichotomy she observes in the existing literature between ‘ herculean ’ and ‘ Sisyphean ’ conceptions of the judicial role. 5 Judges, as Tew shows, are neither all-knowing heroic figures who consistently reach the ‘ correct ’ result, nor are they doomed to perpetual failure. Indeed, by presenting a contextual analysis of judicial strategy in the enterprise of state building in these two postcolonial states, the book charts a middle path for judges that is informed by the political environment. National-level politics in both countries have been dominated by a single party – the Barisan National (BN) coalition in Malaysia and the People ’ s Action Party (PAP) in