Coup leaders often purport to restore constitutional order. During Burkina Faso's 2014 ‘insurrection', however, Blaise Compaoré's opponents advanced detailed (international) legal arguments that significantly constrained their subsequent conduct. Theirs was to be a legal revolution. This article situates this stance within Burkina Faso's distinctive history of urban protest, whilst emphasising under-analysed international sources for the insurrection. ‘Insurgent’ lawyers, it argues, used international instruments to reinvigorate longstanding activist attempts to reconcile constitutional rights with a language of popular justice promoted by the revolutionary regime of Thomas Sankara (1983–7). After the insurrection, however, their emphasis on legality was used by Compaoré's supporters to expose the transitional authorities’ double-standards. Meanwhile, insurgent lawyers working for the transition had to work hard to reconcile (international) legal justifications for the insurrection with the expedient politics needed to defend the new dispensation.

中文翻译：

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革命合法性和布基纳法索起义

政变领导人经常声称要恢复宪法秩序。然而，在布基纳法索 2014 年的“起义”期间，布莱斯·孔波雷的反对者提出了详细的（国际）法律论据，极大地限制了他们随后的行为。他们的革命将是一场法律革命。本文将这一立场置于布基纳法索独特的城市抗议历史中，同时强调对起义的国际来源分析不足。它认为，“叛乱分子”律师使用国际文书来重振长期以来的激进分子试图调和宪法权利与托马斯桑卡拉革命政权（1983-7）所倡导的大众正义语言。然而，在起义之后，孔波雷使用了他们对合法性的强调。的支持者揭露过渡当局的双重标准。与此同时，为过渡工作的叛乱律师必须努力协调（国际）为叛乱辩护的法律理由与捍卫新制度所需的权宜之计政治。