In 2021, the Zeitschrift für ausländisches öffentliches Recht und Völkerrecht (also known as the Heidelberg Journal of International Law) was reborn. Though one of the oldest public and international law journals, its editors have taken the decision to embrace a new era and mode of publishing. The ZaöRV is now a Platinum Open-Access journal.
The notion that scientific progress depends on access to the existing stock of knowledge is an old one. It dates to the 12th century when the French philosopher Bernard of Chartres observed: “We are like dwarfs on the shoulders of giants, so that we can see more than they, and things at a greater distance, not by virtue of any sharpness of sight on our part, or any physical distinction, but because we are carried high and raised up by their giant size.”
Without specifying its meaning or context, openness remains an empty category. It commonly evokes a positive sentiment, but what does it mean to say: We are opening up this or that? And what does it disguise? It even compares with excellence in this respect: a word that is en vogue to be thrown into debates about the future of the academy.
Open Access suggests the absence of gates and gatekeepers – but this is evidently not the case. Who gets to publish what and where is still very much a decision made by certain people in certain positions following certain procedures. Although Open Access carries the promise of removing barriers and democratising access, numerous barriers beyond the obvious ones like paywalls or processing charges exist or are being installed.
Backsliding democracies around the world all face the problem of how to restore the rule of law. Precisely because it is already embedded in European law, with deep Hungarian roots that have long honored European traditions and its international law obligations, Hungary has the option of simply embracing European law to provide a legal path back to the rule of law
I argue that especially in highly polarized social contexts and in divided societies, triggering a new constitution-making procedure requires certain conditions that are necessarily lacking in such circumstances. Oddly, even though these initiatives are motivated by the idea of constitutional restoration, they could easily fail for the same reasons as the constitution they try to mend. When – against the usual and unusual odds – new constitutions are adopted in socially adverse circumstances, the outcome will unavoidably carry the deep tensions and one-sidedness of its environment.
For the first time ever in Hungary, a national primary was held to elect the prime ministerial candidate for the opposition, sparking discussions on constitutional restoration, in particular on amending or replacing the 2011 constitution, the Fundamental Law (FL). Following a brief description of the Hungarian institutional and constitutional landscape, I outline several suggestions as to how the question of constitutional restoration in Hungary might be addressed.
Criminal law serves as the primary tool of choice in Germany's combat against corruption. Yet, apart from the truism that merely tightening the penal framework to combat corruption is useless anyway, there remain deficits. This blog post argues that some of those deficits are to be found not on the level of law in action, but in the law in the books.
Smart-city surveillance is not always used “for the good.” Instead, the faces of regime opponents or, in other contexts, underrepresented minorities, are often self-incriminating elements. It is clear that smart cities pose important problems to privacy and that technology-infused urban spaces bring as many benefits as challenges. I argue that we should be particularly critical of the employment of surveillance technologies in slums because they are by definition vulnerable places from different perspectives.
The call from Andrew Arato and Andras Sajó starts an important and timely debate. It is indeed a thorny question in which cases a formal breach of constitutional norms is the only way to restore constitutionalism. I make three claims: First, while the potential opposition government’s legislative power will indeed be constrained, it will not be entirely powerless. Second, many of these constraints do not stem from constitutional provisions per se, but from informal practices within constitutional organs, and thus cannot be addressed by only formal constitutional changes, revolutionary or otherwise. Third, in the present situation a calculated formal breach of the constitution will most likely lead to civilian strife, political paralysis and radicalization. It will also have the potential to destabilize the European Union.
13. September 2025
Giovanni Capoccia
12. September 2025
Anne Peters
12. September 2025
Anne Peters