INTRODUCTION: CONTEMPORARY ISSUES IN PUBLIC LAW—THEORY, DOCTRINE AND PRACTICE

This is the second part of the special symposium section of the 'Singapore Journal of Legal Studies'; the first was published in September 2019. The two symposia issues bring together a collection of papers that look at contemporary issues relating to public law and litigation in Singapore. Despite the flourishing of research in the area in the recent decade, there are a number of areas of public law that remain under-explored. As highlighted in the Introduction to the September 2019 symposium section, not only has there been an increase in the number of applications for judicial review, there has also been an increasing diversity in the issues mooted in courts in recent years. Since the last symposium issue was published, applicants have continued to bring important public law issues to court. The courts have had to consider the effect of ouster clauses in legislation, whether and when courts can adopt a rectifying construction of legislation, the constitutionality of holding general elections in 2020 during the coronavirus pandemic implicating once more the 'right to vote' in the courts, the constitutionality of the mode of carrying out the death penalty, challenges of correction directions issued pursuant to the new 'Protection from Online Falsehoods and Manipulation Act 2019' and further challenges to section 377A of the 'Penal Code'. The courts have also recently looked at applying a proportionality-style of analysis to the review of the constitutionality of legislation.