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Dr. Jaclyn L. Neo

Dr. Jaclyn L. Neo

Law Professor

LLB (Hons) (NUS); LLM (Yale); JSD (Yale)

Associate Professor and Director of the Centre for Asian Legal Studies at the National University of Singapore Faculty of Law.

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Rediscovering the Constitutional Preamble? How Judges Enlist Preambles to Legitimate Transformative Interpretations

Rediscovering the Constitutional Preamble? How Judges Enlist Preambles to Legitimate Transformative Interpretations

Rediscovering the Constitutional Preamble? How Judges Enlist Preambles to Legitimate Transformative Interpretations

(2025) The American Journal of Comparative Law (with Diego W Arguelhes) This article examines how constitutional preambles have been employed by courts, regardless of—and often contrary to—their formal legal status and the political expectations of constitution-makers.

Constitutional Law

What Would a Pluralist Institutional Approach to Constitutional Interpretation Look Like? Some Methodological Implications

What Would a Pluralist Institutional Approach to Constitutional Interpretation Look Like? Some Methodological Implications

What Would a Pluralist Institutional Approach to Constitutional Interpretation Look Like? Some Methodological Implications

20(5) International Journal of Constitutional Law (2022) (with Maartje de Visser) https://doi.org/10.1093/icon/moac112 This article makes...

Constitutional Law

Constitutionalizing Care: How Can We Expand Our Constitutional Imaginary After Covid-19?

Constitutionalizing Care: How Can We Expand Our Constitutional Imaginary After Covid-19?

Constitutionalizing Care: How Can We Expand Our Constitutional Imaginary After Covid-19?

20(3) International Journal of Constitutional Law (2022) This framing article for a symposium on Covid-19 seeks to address the question of whether constitutional law should be rethought, recalibrated to create a more resilient, more egalitarian, and more protective constitutional order.

Constitutional Law

Religious Courts and Rights in Plural Societies: Interlegal Gaps and the Need for Complex Concurrency

Religious Courts and Rights in Plural Societies: Interlegal Gaps and the Need for Complex Concurrency

Religious Courts and Rights in Plural Societies: Interlegal Gaps and the Need for Complex Concurrency

15(2) Law and Ethics of Human Rights 259-285 (2021) This article interrogates certain assumptions made about state legal pluralism, arguing that far from being a pseudo-monist arrangement, state legal pluralism are potentially productive site of interlegality.

Law and Religion

Religious Minorities in Asia: Between the Scylla of Minority Protection and Charybdis of Religious Freedom Rights?

Religious Minorities in Asia: Between the Scylla of Minority Protection and Charybdis of Religious Freedom Rights?

Religious Minorities in Asia: Between the Scylla of Minority Protection and Charybdis of Religious Freedom Rights?

12(1) Religions 881 (2021) This article examines an under-theorized intersection of religious freedom and minority protection.

Law and Religion

Expanding the Universe of Comparative Constitutional Amendment in Southeast Asia

Expanding the Universe of Comparative Constitutional Amendment in Southeast Asia

Expanding the Universe of Comparative Constitutional Amendment in Southeast Asia

14(1) Journal of Comparative Law 46-55 (2019) This introductory article to a special issue on Constitutional Amendment in Southeast Asia centres the region as an essential, yet often overlooked, site for understanding constitutional amendment and constitutional change more broadly.

Constitutional Law

Autonomy, Deference, and Control: Judicial Doctrine and Facets of Separation of Powers in Singapore

Autonomy, Deference, and Control: Judicial Doctrine and Facets of Separation of Powers in Singapore

Autonomy, Deference, and Control: Judicial Doctrine and Facets of Separation of Powers in Singapore

5(2) Journal of International and Comparative Law 461 (2018) The article posits that courts engage with the principle of separation of powers through multiple and sometimes competing conceptions, each shaping constitutional doctrine in distinct ways.

Constitutional Law

Incorporating Human Rights: Mitigated Dualism and Interpretation in Malaysian Courts

Incorporating Human Rights: Mitigated Dualism and Interpretation in Malaysian Courts

Incorporating Human Rights: Mitigated Dualism and Interpretation in Malaysian Courts

18 Asian Yearbook of International Law 1-37 (2012) DOI: https://doi.org/10.1163/9789004379732_002 (Winner of the DILA International Law...

Constitutional Law

Equal Protection and the Reasonable Classification Test in Singapore: After Lim Meng Suang v AG

Equal Protection and the Reasonable Classification Test in Singapore: After Lim Meng Suang v AG

Equal Protection and the Reasonable Classification Test in Singapore: After Lim Meng Suang v AG

Singapore J. of Legal Studies 95-117 (2016) Available at: https://ssrn.com/abstract=2762132 The realisation of the almost universally...

Constitutional Law

Secular Constitutionalism in Singapore: Between Equality and Hierarchy

Secular Constitutionalism in Singapore: Between Equality and Hierarchy

Secular Constitutionalism in Singapore: Between Equality and Hierarchy

Oxford J. of Law & Religion 431-456 (2016) https://doi.org/10.1093/ojlr/rww044 The Singapore constitution has often been described and...

Law and Religion

Navigating Minority Inclusion & Permanent Division: Minorities & the Depoliticization of Ethnic Diff

Navigating Minority Inclusion & Permanent Division: Minorities & the Depoliticization of Ethnic Diff

Navigating Minority Inclusion & Permanent Division: Minorities & the Depoliticization of Ethnic Diff

Jus Politicum 607-627 (January 2017) Available at: http://juspoliticum.com/article/Navigating-Minority-Inclusion-and-Permanent-Division-M...

Constitutional Law

All Power Has Legal Limits: The Principle of Legality as a Constitutional Principle of Judicial Rev

All Power Has Legal Limits: The Principle of Legality as a Constitutional Principle of Judicial Rev

All Power Has Legal Limits: The Principle of Legality as a Constitutional Principle of Judicial Rev

29 Singapore Academy of Law Journal 667-689 (2017) Available at: https://journalsonline.academypublishing.org.sg/Journals/Singapore-Acade...

Constitutional Law

Autonomy, Deference and Control: Judicial Doctrine and Facets of Separation of Powers in Singapore

Autonomy, Deference and Control: Judicial Doctrine and Facets of Separation of Powers in Singapore

Autonomy, Deference and Control: Judicial Doctrine and Facets of Separation of Powers in Singapore

5(2) Journal of International and Comparative Law 2018 This article examines judicial engagement with the idea of separation of powers in...

Constitutional Law

Unwritten Constitutional Norms: Finding the Singapore Constitution

Unwritten Constitutional Norms: Finding the Singapore Constitution

Unwritten Constitutional Norms: Finding the Singapore Constitution

Law Gazette (May 2019) This article examines the judicial articulation of unwritten constitutional norms in Singapore over the last few...

Constitutional Law

Making the Singapore Constitution: Amendments as Constitution-Making

Making the Singapore Constitution: Amendments as Constitution-Making

Making the Singapore Constitution: Amendments as Constitution-Making

14(1) Journal of Comparative Law 72-93 (2019) (with Andrea Ong Hui Xian) This article posits that constitution-making and constitutional...

Constitutional Law

A Contextual Approach to Unconstitutional Constitutional Amendments:

A Contextual Approach to Unconstitutional Constitutional Amendments:

A Contextual Approach to Unconstitutional Constitutional Amendments:

Judicial Power and the Basic Structure Doctrine in Malaysia 15(1) Asian Journal of Comparative Law 69-94 (2020) DOI:...

Constitutional Law

Malay Nationalism, Islamic Supremacy and the Constitutional Bargain in the Multi-ethnic Composition

Malay Nationalism, Islamic Supremacy and the Constitutional Bargain in the Multi-ethnic Composition

Malay Nationalism, Islamic Supremacy and the Constitutional Bargain in the Multi-ethnic Composition

International Journal on Minority and Group Rights (2006) 13, pp 95–118 https://doi.org/10.1163/157181106777069950 This article examines...

Constitutional Law

Dimensions of Religious Harmony as Constitutional Practice: Beyond State Control

Dimensions of Religious Harmony as Constitutional Practice: Beyond State Control

Dimensions of Religious Harmony as Constitutional Practice: Beyond State Control

German Law Journal (2019), 20, pp. 966–985 doi: 10.1017/glj.2019.78 This article provides a close analysis of the idea of religious...

Law and Religion

Definitional imbroglios: A critique of the definition of religion and essential practice tests

Definitional imbroglios: A critique of the definition of religion and essential practice tests

Definitional imbroglios: A critique of the definition of religion and essential practice tests

16(2) International Journal of Constitutional Law (I-CON) 574-595 (2018) DOI: 10.1093/icon/moy055 This article critiques the use of...

Law and Religion

Change and Continuity: The Constitutional Head of State and Democratic Transitions in Malaysia

Change and Continuity: The Constitutional Head of State and Democratic Transitions in Malaysia

Change and Continuity: The Constitutional Head of State and Democratic Transitions in Malaysia

Malayan Law Journal (2012) 5, pp. i- xxiv Download a copy here: https://www.academia.edu/1896947/Change_and_Continuity_The_Constitutional...

Constitutional Law

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