At first glance, Ely’s theory of judicial review in Democracy and Distrust may seem an obviously poor fit for South Africa’s extensive and value-based constitutionalism. South African scholars have indeed mostly paid his theory little attention and, when they do, have mostly done so in support of arguments for judicial review, rather than to impose limits on it. On closer inspection, however, the way Ely has been used in South Africa has much to tell us about South African constitutionalism. The patterns of democratic deference of his theory can be a better fit for actual South African practice than it is for much of the scholarship interpreting that practice. Arguments for trust in democratic institutions, though suggested rather than developed in his book, have a powerful constitutional value in emerging systems like the South Africa one. Finally, though concerns for democracy that underpin Ely’s account have fallen somewhat between the lines of existing South African constitutional talk, the constitutional value of majoritarian democracy has a resonance in post-apartheid South Africa that should be felt more in its scholarship, and may yet be.

中文翻译：

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伊利可能存在的漏洞：南非的民主和信任

乍一看，伊利的《民主与不信任》中的司法审查理论似乎显然不适合南非广泛的、以价值为基础的宪政主义。南非学者确实大多很少关注他的理论，当他们这样做时，他们大多这样做是为了支持司法审查的论点，而不是对其施加限制。然而，仔细观察，伊利在南非的使用方式可以告诉我们很多关于南非宪政的信息。他的理论的民主服从模式可能更适合南非的实际实践，而不是解释该实践的大部分学术研究。支持信任民主制度的论点虽然在他的书中提出而不是发展，但在像南非这样的新兴系统中具有强大的宪法价值。