The Constitution of Freedom

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
András Sajó ◽  
Renáta Uitz
Keyword(s):  
Constitutional Law ◽  
Legal Order ◽  
Political Community ◽  
The Political ◽  
Constitutional Democracy ◽  
Constant Attention ◽  
Constitutional System

With the rise of populist, anti-constitutional sentiment and the normalization of the anti-terror state it has once again become imperative to explain what constitutionalism means for the constitutional legal order and the political community which is meant to live by it. This book’s intention is less to guide technically proper constitution-writing and interpretation, but rather showing what is at stake in the debate on constitutionalism. It aims to demonstrate why constitutionalism should continue to matter. In doing so, the constitutional facts are left to speak for themselves. Muses and technicians of classic constitutions are lined up alongside the inspired architects of more recent ones to show what constitutionalism can be about and what constitutions have become in constitutional law. Constitutional democracy is more fragile and less ‘natural’ than autocracy. Unfortunately, more and more people find autocracy attractive, because they were never forced to understand or imagine what despotism is. They also conveniently failed to protect themselves emotionally and intellectually against the cult of simple solutions. Generations who lived in stable democracies with the promise that their enviable world will become the global ‘normal’ find this difficult to conceive. It is difficult, but never too late to look at one’s own constitutional system as one that is fragile and in need of constant attention and care. Therefore, recapitulating how constitutionalism protects us and how it can be undone with its very own means became the task of this book.

Introduction

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
András Sajó ◽  
Renáta Uitz
Keyword(s):  
Social Dynamics ◽  
Legal Order ◽  
Political Community ◽  
The Political ◽  
Abuse Of Power ◽  
Practical Applications

This book examines the implications of constitutionalism for the constitutional legal order and the political community which is meant to live by it. The book demonstrates what is at stake in the debate on constitutionalism through numerous examples of political anomalies and abuse of power. It presents stories of constitutional success and failure to give a sense of the current threats, arguing that constitutions are not mere practical applications of political philosophies or opportunistic political deals. The book considers foundational issues related to constitutions and constitutionalism as reflected in influential ideas, political practices, and social dynamics behind the scenes.

The Constitutional Crisis

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Noah Benezra Strote
Keyword(s):  
Labor Unions ◽  
Common Ground ◽  
The Political ◽  
Constitutional Democracy ◽  
Moral Principles ◽  
Legislative Branch ◽  
Parliamentary Supremacy ◽  
Constitutional System ◽  
The Stability ◽  
The Great War

This chapter explores both sides of the country's deep-seated class conflict, which revealed itself in a public debate about constitutional democracy between the highest levels of the judiciary and the leaders of Germany's powerful labor unions. Legal theorists often emphasize the importance of reaching consensus on moral principles for the stability of a constitutional system. In Germany, that consensus did not exist. The political representatives whom Germans elected after the Great War to draft a constitution could agree that the new German state should be a republic as opposed to a monarchy. However, they could not find common ground regarding as foundational a question as the authority of the three branches of government and their proper relationship to one another. Most important, minds diverged on whether the state should embrace parliamentary supremacy: the idea that the legislative branch, not the judicial or executive, should enjoy final authority in national decision making.

Continuity with Deficiencies: The New Basic Law of Hungary

2013 ◽  
Vol 9 (1) ◽  
pp. 102-138 ◽  
Author(s):  
András Jakab ◽  
Pál Sonnevend
Keyword(s):  
Constitutional Law ◽  
The State ◽  
Fundamental Rights ◽  
Political Community ◽  
The Political ◽  
Basic Law ◽  
The Government ◽  
Democratic Constitution ◽  
Legal Procedures

Hungarian constitutional law – New Basic Law – Continuity with the previous democratic Constitution – Vision of the political community embedded in the new Basic Law – The level of protection of fundamental rights – Continuity and lack of foreseeability in the organisation of the state – European legal procedures against or about Hungary – The life prospects of the new Basic Law – Danger of constitutional crisis whenever the government does not hold a constitution-amending majority

THE THEORY AND PRACTICE OF ‘SUPRA-CONSTITUTIONAL’ LIMITS ON CONSTITUTIONAL AMENDMENTS

2013 ◽  
Vol 62 (3) ◽  
pp. 557-597 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yaniv Roznai
Keyword(s):  
International Law ◽  
Constitutional Law ◽  
Legal Order ◽  
Theory And Practice ◽  
Constitutional Amendment ◽  
Constitutional Amendments ◽  
National Courts ◽  
Constitutional System ◽  
The Relationship

AbstractThis article examines whether there are any limitations on constitutional amendment powers that are external to the constitutional system and above it—‘supra-constitutional’ limits. It considers the theory and practice of the relationship between natural law, international law or other supranational law, and domestic constitutional law in a comparative prism. After considering the alleged supremacy of supranational law over constitutional amendments, the author explores the problem of the relationship between the different legal orders in the external/internal juridical spheres, and the important potential and actual role of national courts in ‘domesticating’ supranational law and enforcing its supremacy. It is claimed that despite the growing influence of supranational law, state practice demonstrates that constitutional law is still generally superior to international law, and even when the normative hierarchical superiority of supranational law is recognized within the domestic legal order, this supremacy derives not from supranational law as a separate legal order, but rather from the constitution itself. Therefore, it is claimed that existing practice regarding arguments of ‘supra-constitutional’ limitations are better described by explicit or implicit limitations within the constitution itself, through which supranational standards can be infused to serve as valid limitations on constitutional amendment powers.

Hume's Constitutionalism and the Identity of Constitutional Democracy

1996 ◽  
Vol 90 (3) ◽  
pp. 488-496 ◽  
Author(s):  
Robert A. Manzer
Keyword(s):  
Collective Identity ◽  
Political Community ◽  
The Political ◽  
Constitutional Democracy ◽  
Critical Consideration

Modern constitutional democracy entails a particular kind of political self-understanding that uniquely centers on a constitution. While many recent studies have focused on how constitutional text shapes this self-understanding, little attention has been paid to the implications of different views of constitutional authority. This is a critical consideration, however, because constitutional authority has always been intrinsically fragile within constitutional democracy, and never more so than at present. In this article, I explore the potential of constitutional science to generate a conception of constitutional authority and collective identity. I focus on David Hume's effort to use constitutional science to shape opinion about liberty and the nature of the political community. This analysis also provides a basis for reflecting on the problematic relation of democracy to constitutionalism and on the peculiar problem of constitutional opinion in constitutional democracy.

AKSIOLOŠKE OSNOVE USTAVNE DEMOKRATIJE I POPULIZMA

2021 ◽  
pp. 125-135
Author(s):  
Dejan Matić ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Liberal Democracy ◽  
Political System ◽  
The State ◽  
Legal Order ◽  
The Political ◽  
Constitutional Democracy ◽  
Complete Understanding ◽  
Conceptual Definition ◽  
Definition Of ◽  
Legal Processes

The paper discusses the axiological foundations of constitutional democracy and populism, as well as the influence of populist movements on law, legal processes, liberal democracy and the state order as a whole. The conceptual definition of populism in the situation of stable functioning of the political system inevitably leads to the conclusion that it represents an anomaly and an absolutely retrograde political phenomenon in the conditions of globalization and constant changes in modern societies. A serious crisis of the political system, that is, consequently, of the state- legal order as a whole, puts things on a completely new basis, providing an opportunity for a deeper and more complete understanding of the phenomenon of populism and its impact on constitutionalism and democracy.

Religion and the Construction of a Christian Roman Polity

2020 ◽  
Vol 4 (1) ◽  
pp. 76-113
Author(s):  
Francesco Rotiroti
Keyword(s):  
Theoretical Framework ◽  
Political Community ◽  
The Political ◽  
Political Dimension ◽  
Roman World ◽  
Recent Scholarship ◽  
Theories Of Religion ◽  
Ancient Christianity

This article seeks to define a theoretical framework for the study of the relation between religion and the political community in the Roman world and to analyze a particular case in point. The first part reviews two prominent theories of religion developed in the last fifty years through the combined efforts of anthropologists and classicists, arguing for their complementary contribution to the understanding of religion's political dimension. It also provides an overview of the approaches of recent scholarship to the relation between religion and the Roman polity, contextualizing the efforts of this article toward a theoretical reframing of the political and institutional elements of ancient Christianity. The second part focuses on the religious legislation of the Theodosian Code, with particular emphasis on the laws against the heretics and their performance in the construction of the political community. With their characteristic language of exclusion, these laws signal the persisting overlap between the borders of the political community and the borders of religion, in a manner that one would expect from pre-Christian civic religions. Nevertheless, the political essence of religion did also adapt to the ecumenical dimension of the empire. Indeed, the religious norms of the Code appear to structure a community whose borders tend to be identical to the borders of the whole inhabited world, within which there is no longer room for alternative affiliations; the only possible identity outside this community is that of the insane, not belonging to any political entity and thus unable to possess any right.

Searching for Political Parties in the Past

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Piero Ignazi
Keyword(s):  
Eighteenth Century ◽  
Political Parties ◽  
Political Party ◽  
Ancient Greece ◽  
Political Community ◽  
Democratic Politics ◽  
The Political ◽  
The Past ◽  
The Common

Chapter 1 introduces the long and difficult process of the theoretical legitimation of the political party as such. The analysis of the meaning and acceptance of ‘parties’ as tools of expressing contrasting visions moves forward from ancient Greece and Rome where (democratic) politics had first become a matter of speculation and practice, and ends up with the first cautious acceptance of parties by eighteenth-century British thinkers. The chapter explores how parties or factions have been constantly considered tools of division of the ‘common wealth’ and the ‘good society’. The holist and monist vision of a harmonious and compounded society, stigmatized parties and factions as an ultimate danger for the political community. Only when a new way of thinking, that is liberalism, emerged, was room for the acceptance of parties set.

Neurointerventions, Morality, and Children

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Matthew Clayton ◽  
Andres Moles
Keyword(s):  
Young Children ◽  
Political Community ◽  
Moral Enhancement ◽  
Individual Autonomy ◽  
The Political ◽  
Moral Conduct ◽  
Moral Behaviour ◽  
Moral Constraint ◽  
The Ideal ◽  
Moral Limits

Is the political community morally permitted to use neurointerventions to improve the moral conduct of children? Putting aside difficult questions concerning the institutionalization of moral enhancement, the authors address this question, first, by arguing that is not, in itself, always morally impermissible for the community to impose neurointerventions on adults. Although certain ideals, such as the ideal of individual autonomy, limit the permissible employment of neurointerventions, they do not generate a moral constraint that always forbids their use. Thereafter, they argue that because young children lack certain moral capacities that adults possess, the moral limits that pertain to the use of neurointerventions to improve their moral behaviour are, in principle, less restrictive than they are for adults.

Turnout in Multi-Level Systems

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sona N. Golder ◽  
Ignacio Lago ◽  
André Blais ◽  
Elisabeth Gidengil ◽  
Thomas Gschwend
Keyword(s):  
National Level ◽  
The Body ◽  
Political Community ◽  
The Political ◽  
European Level ◽  
National Elections ◽  
Political Issues ◽  
European Elections ◽  
Multi Level ◽  
Different Levels

Voters face different incentives to turn out to vote in one electoral arena versus another. Although turnout is lowest in European elections, it is found that the turnout is only slightly lower in regional than in national elections. Standard accounts suggest that the importance of an election, in terms of the policy-making power of the body to be elected, drives variation in turnout across elections at different levels. This chapter argues that this is only part of the story, and that voter attachment to a particular level also matters. Not all voters feel connected to each electoral arena in the same way. Although for some, their identity and the issues they most care about are linked to politics at the national level, for others, the regional or European level may offer the political community and political issues that most resonate with them.

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