Europe has produced 24% of the world’s constitutional systems since 1789. The first constitutions in the region were written in Poland and France in 1789. The average constitution over this period has endured 25.8 years.
Browse the timeline below, which is built from the Comparative Constitution Project’s chronology of constitutional events data, or explore the individual countries further to learn more.
Timeline of Constitutions
Data from the Comparative Constitutions Project.
Key to constitutions
New
Amendments
PDF Link
Suspended
Interim
No longer in force
-
This region includes the following countries
- Albania
- Andorra
- Austria
- Belarus
- Belgium
- Bosnia and Herzegovina
- Bulgaria
- Croatia
- Czech Republic
- Denmark
- Estonia
- Finland
- France
- Germany
- Greece
- Hungary
- Iceland
- Ireland
- Italy
- Kosovo
- Latvia
- Liechtenstein
- Lithuania
- Luxembourg
- Malta
- Moldova (Republic of)
- Monaco
- Montenegro
- Netherlands
- North Macedonia (Republic of)
- Norway
- Poland
- Portugal
- Romania
- Russian Federation
- Serbia
- Slovakia
- Slovenia
- Spain
- Sweden
- Switzerland
- Ukraine
- United Kingdom
Notes
For analysis of constitutional lifespans see: Elkins, Zachary, Tom Ginsburg, and James Melton. The Endurance of National Constitutions. Cambridge University Press, 2009.
Thanks to Jonathan Corum, who designed the original version of the timeline graphic.