The US is on their second republic because the articles of confederation failed, and is looking down the barrel of a second dissolution as we speak. France is on their fifth republic, because the previous four republics failed. If France’s latest success is due to their people, wouldn’t that contradict their previous failures?
Sure, the people have an outsized influence on the success of a nation, but the institutions also shape the people and empower some people over others. Can you imagine how much differently the US would look if it wasn’t founded on slavery and oppression? If women didnt have to wait 150 years to vote? If we didn’t institutionalize a gerrymanderable legislative system?
The institutions matter AND people matter, but bad institutions empower terrible people.
> France is on their fifth republic, because the previous four republics failed.
I don’t think that is really fair on France - many of those failures were due to defeats in war - for example, the Third Republic didn’t “fail”, it was conquered by Nazi Germany - and when it was liberated, the French decided to take the opportunity to rewrite their constitution, but I think that was a choice rather than something they were forced into.
And the Fifth Republic was engineered by de Gaulle given the opportunity of the 1958 coup attempt. If de Gaulle had unexpectedly died of a heart attack in 1957, the Fourth Republic might have survived. Probably the 1958 coup attempt would still have occurred even absent de Gaulle - but neither its success nor failure would have necessitated a rewrite of the constitution (as opposed to maybe just some tweaks), although certainly it could have resulted in one. Even de Gaulle didn’t have to rewrite the constitution, he decided he wanted to and was handed the opportunity to get what he wanted, but maybe in some alternative timeline he didn’t feel as strongly about that and so the constitutional rewrite never happened
Why didn’t the American Civil War result in a rewrite of the US constitution? Probably because the Union had a clear and convincing victory. If the Union had lost, or if the war had turned into a stalemate, much greater odds the US constitution would not have survived it - a less-defeated Confederacy might have negotiated reintegration into the Union subject to a constitutional rewrite; if the Confederacy had won and retained its independence, the Union might well have decided to write a new constitution in response.
> The US is on their second republic because the articles of confederation failed, and is looking down the barrel of a second dissolution as we speak.
The US constitutional system has arguably been reconstituted at least 3 times (in order of plausibility): US Civil War and Reconstruction amendments, FDR and New Deal, LBJ and Civil Rights Act of 1964. The latter two were not even primarily accomplished via formal Constitutional amendment, just a reinterpretation of what the Constitution allowed and compelled. What makes Trump different than those? Just the fact that, unlike the first three, it's more right-wing than progressive?
I’m not saying that whatever is happening now is necessarily good, but will it lead to the collapse of the US Constitution?
Sure, the people have an outsized influence on the success of a nation, but the institutions also shape the people and empower some people over others. Can you imagine how much differently the US would look if it wasn’t founded on slavery and oppression? If women didnt have to wait 150 years to vote? If we didn’t institutionalize a gerrymanderable legislative system?
The institutions matter AND people matter, but bad institutions empower terrible people.