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tutional process taking shape in a context of severe state weakness (p. 260). All of these cases of constitution-making in the context of revolution illustrate that the rule of law is not free of the vicissitudes of politics or the weight of history. They also reveal the inadequacy of various approaches to constituent power. These include theories advanced by “populist” philosophers reflecting all colors of the political rainbow (from the Abbe Sieyès to Carl Schmitt and from Ernst-Wolfgang Böckenförde to Antonio Negri), as well as “constitutionalist” theorists ranging from Hannah Arendt to Hans Lindahl. By virtue of his command of the literature, Sultany is able to map the theoretical terrain with precision, showing how populists differ from constitutionalist in so far as the former insist on a limitless constituent power that is inexhaustible and the latter call for “lawful” limits to democratic will and see constitutional enactment as a terminal point (p. 290). The judiciary in Egypt and Tunisia effectively rejected the populist approach, constraining popular will to a great degree, contributing with their rulings to the extinguishment of its flames (p. 321). Their practices, however, did not achieve a synthesis between constituent power and constitutional form of the sort desired by constitutionalists nor did they prevent the instability and violence that the latter dreaded the most. Sultany correctly infers from this that “constitutional legitimations are no more than validations based on abstract principles whose applications and interpretations are controversial and contested” (p. 321). While Sultany demonstrates the incoherence of revolutionary constitutional processes, he distinguishes between them and the reformist constitutionalism that took place in the context of the Arab Spring in Morocco, Jordan, Bahrain, Oman, and Algeria. As much as revolutionary models were deficient in their application of popular sovereignty as well as participation, reformist exercises comprehensively excluded both. In all of the countries surveyed, the reigning executive power installed reform committees lacking in any serious input from the citizenry, arriving at documents that were normatively vacuous, failing to increase regime accountability or to expand the rights of citizens (p. 287). Notwithstanding the major differences between revolutionary and reformist models, Sultany once again resists the temptation of overlooking their commonalities. When it comes to outcomes, these models, he suggests, differ in degree rather than in kind, the reformist version being simply more radically exclusionary. As for similarities, they can be seen in the shared heightened concern with the stability of the existing or the emerging regime, in the common failure to constrain executive power, and in the persistence of strong continuities with the past (p. 288). The sober picture painted by Sultany should not mask his evident commitment to emancipatory potentialities. This is clearly manifested in the afterward, in which he laments the “faltering of revolution” that occurred after the initial moments of hope. Far from providing a cautionary tale against revolution, his book calls for a more revolutionary approach to law. As was proven by the events that took place in Algeria and Sudan after the publication of Law and Revolution, he was right to conclude that “perhaps the Arab Spring has not ended yet” (p. 324).