"This book concerns a set of problems that arise from the distinctive conceptual and practical tension in the first period after a new constitution has been adopted. We shall argue that at a very general level, a new constitution must manage a balance or tension between two forces. These are aspirations for transformation and demands for preservation through entrenchment. The first period, as we will elaborate, is the conceptual, temporal, and institutional bridge between the past and future. It is the moment when the transformative and the preservative vectors of constitutional design can come into the sharpest conflict. The variable nature of these conflicts-and the diverse means through which they are mediated, whether successfully or less successfully-is the focus of both this introduction and, in different ways, the chapters that follow"--