This overview article introduces the special issue on “The Directive Constitution in the varieties of constitutionalism”, which revisits debates on the constituição dirigente in Portugal and Brazil, analyses the genealogy, substance and evolution of the concept, and compares it to its Anglophone sibling transformative constitutionalism. The article argues that studying directive constitutionalism makes important contributions to comparative constitutional scholarship, especially to debates on constitutional typology and non-liberal varieties of constitutionalism, to the literature on constitutional transfers and the political economy of legal knowledge, and to normative critiques of non-liberal varieties of constitutionalism in the face of democratic decline and authoritarian challenges.
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