Verfassungserosion, demokratischer Rückschritt, verfassungsrechtliche Herausforderungen demokratischer Regierungsführung, populistischer Konstitutionalismus und verfassungsrechtliche Antworten auf Autoritarismus. Umfasst wehrhafte Demokratie, verfassungsrechtliche Selbstverteidigung und verfassungsrechtliche Mechanismen gegen demokratische Erosion.
The multilateral response should focus on the constitutionality of the Tatmadaw’s actions. Myanmar’s state of emergency is a military coup d’état, and is flagrantly unconstitutional. The international community should support Myanmar’s democratically elected government by insisting that the constitution be followed, and civilian authority restored immediately.
In 2020 the degradation of the Polish Constitutional Tribunal’s position deepened. This stage of the crisis of the constitutional judiciary in Poland can be illustrated with two rulings from 2020
On 13 January 2016, exactly five years ago today, the Commission activated the so-called rule of law framework for the very first time with respect to Poland. Ever since, the Polish authorities’ sustained and systematic attacks on the rule of law directly threaten the very functioning of the EU legal order. Part II of this series examines the key rulings of 2020 and urges EU authorities to act.
On 13 January 2016, exactly five years ago today, the Commission activated the so-called rule of law framework for the very first time with respect to Poland. Ever since, the Polish authorities’ sustained and systematic attacks on the rule of law directly threaten the very functioning of the EU legal order. In what has become an annual series of dire warnings, this is an overview of the 2020 developments regarding the deterioration of the rule of law in Poland.
President Trump is dangerous. He must be removed from office. Immediately. There are three ways to do this.
The long-awaited Demirtaş v. Turkey (No 2) Grand Chamber judgment has finally been delivered, twenty two months after referral and sixteen months since the 18 September 2019 hearing. The judgment, arguably the most important from the Grand Chamber in 2020, is highly significant for both political and jurisprudential reasons. Politically, the case concerns the ongoing deprivation of liberty of Selahattin Demirtaş – the former leader of the left-wing, pro-Kurdish Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP), the second-largest opposition party in Turkey.
The announced veto of the Hungarian and Polish governments on the EU multi-annual budget and the European recovery fund has caused a major stir in recent days in Europe. The conditionality mechanism is designed to safeguard the Union’s financial interests and complements the existing political and judicial mechanisms. It is expedient to review the state of play of the procedures in place and, if necessary, to pose questions, whether they stand up to the challenges posed by developments in the respective countries, if they are carried out in a timely manner and focus on genuine effectiveness.
Yes, the Turkish Central Bank’s independence has been eroded in recent years. Yes, from 2016 until now, the Bank has had four different presidents (or governors, as they are called), which is unusual by all accounts. No, the Bank is therefore probably not independent — or as independent — as its Western counterparts. I do not find these somewhat trite but true statements about the Bank’s independence (or the lack thereof) terribly interesting. Not that they are unimportant, but because I think the erosion of the Bank’s independence is illustrative of deeper and far more curious attributes of competitive authoritarian regimes and how they sustain themselves (or fail at doing that).
Donald Trump’s defeat at the US presidential election has wrong-footed some of his staunchest loyalists in Central and Eastern Europe. In Estonia, the former master pupil in the CEE ‘class of democracy’, the Trumpist part of the government has suffered a kind of public nervous breakdown with a set of unrestrained remarks aired on a radio talk show on 8 November about the allegedly ‘rigged elections’ in the US and the ‘corrupt character’ of the US President-Elect Joe Biden. This crassly undiplomatic spell of verbal incontinence by the prominent representatives of the Conservative People’s Party of Estonia (EKRE), including two members of the government, culminated in the resignation of the Minister of the Interior Mart Helme.
The most recent abortion decision of 22 October 2020 of Poland’s Constitutional Court (“the Court”) did not come as a surprise. It is not, as some commentators would like to see, an aberration, a departure from previous liberal and human rights-based standards by a group of judges linked to the Law and Justice party. Rather, it is a consequence of the right-wing constitutionalism that has dominated the Court for years. This discourse that introduced religious dogma as the basis for legal reasoning is undemocratic and exclusionary. It presents religious worldviews as textual consequences of the constitution without taking into account the voice of citizens. The persistence of this type of constitutionalism can be demonstrated on example of a number of cases important for the public sphere in Poland.
13. September 2025
Giovanni Capoccia
12. September 2025
Anne Peters
12. September 2025
Anne Peters