Hostname: page-component-77c89778f8-sh8wx Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-07-21T12:30:28.077Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Collective Bonapartism – Democracy in the European Crisis

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  06 March 2019

Hauke Brunkhorst

Extract

Core share and HTML view are not available for this content. However, as you have access to this content, a full PDF is available via the ‘Save PDF’ action button.

My paper has two parts. In the first part I will outline an evolutionary model for analyzing the relation of democracy, cosmopolitanism and conflict. In the second part I will apply it to the case of European constitutionalization, and its failure.

Type
Special Section: Europe and the Lost Generation
Information
German Law Journal , Volume 15 , Issue 6 , 01 October 2014 , pp. 1177 - 1195
Copyright
Copyright © 2014 by German Law Journal GbR 

References

1 Koskenniemi, Martti, Constitutionalism as Mindset: Reflections on Kantian Themes About International Law and Globalization, 8 Theoretical Inquiries in Law 9 (2006).Google Scholar

2 Koskenniemi, Martti, From Apologia to Utopia: The Structure of International Legal Argument (1989). The German Law Journal published a special issue marking the re-issue of the book by Cambridge University Press in 2006. See Morag Goodwin & Alexandra Kemmerer, Editorial: The Same Performance, and so Different: Marking the Re-publication of From Apology to Utopia, 7 German Law Journal 977 (2006).Google Scholar

3 Koskenniemi, Martti, The Gentle Civilizer of Nations 413-415, 494-509 (2002).Google Scholar

4 Id. Google Scholar

5 Koskenniemi, Martti, What Should International Lawyers Learn from Karl Marx, 17 Leiden Journal of International Law 229, 245 (2004).Google Scholar

6 Id. Google Scholar

7 Somek, Alexander, Europe: From Emancipation to Empowerment (unpublished manuscript, 2012).Google Scholar

8 Marx, Karl, Kritik des Hegelschen Staatsrechts, in 1 Karl Marx/Friedrich Engels - Werke 203, 260 (1976) (English quoted from Karl Marx, Critique of Hegel's Philosophy of Right 57 (Joseph O'Malley ed., 1970)).Google Scholar

9 Marx, Karl, Der 18. Brumaire des Louis Bonaparte 97 (1852) (English quoted from: http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1852/18th-brumaire/ch01.htm).Google Scholar

10 Merkel, See Angela, Über die Marktkonforme Parlamentarische Demokratie (Sept. 3, 2011), available at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VLfQn7vie6c&noredirect=1.Google Scholar

11 Bernau, See Patrick, Die Schwäbische Hausfrau, Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung (May 16, 2010), available at http://www.faz.net/aktuell/wirtschaft/schulden-die-schwaebische-hausfrau-1979097.html.Google Scholar

12 Kant, Immanuel, Zum ewigen Frieden, in XI Werke 191, 210 (1977).Google Scholar

13 Luhmann, Niklas, Verfassung als evolutionäre Errungenschaft, 8 Rechtshistorisches Journal 176 (1990) (using the German phrases “Machbarkeitsillusionen,” “feierliche Erklärungen,” und “Gesänge”.).Google Scholar

14 On the distinction see, Friedrich Müller, “Richterrecht” – Elemente einer Verfassungstheorie IV 13, 34, 38, 47, 88 (1986); Friedrich Müller, “Demokratie zwischen Staatsrecht und Weltrecht. Nationale, staatlose und globale Formen menschenrechtsgestützter Globalisierung” – Elemente einer Verfassungstheorie VIII 52-53 (2003); Friedrich Müller & Ralph Christensen, II Juristische Methodik: Europarecht 170, 185, 198-199, 363, 437-438 (2007).Google Scholar

15 See Luhmann, , supra note 13.Google Scholar

16 Luhmann, Niklas, Das Recht der Gesellschaft 78-95, 555 (1993).Google Scholar

17 For the sociology of rationalization, law and religion, see Jürgen Habermas, Zur Rekonstruktion des Historischen Materialismus (1976); Jürgen Habermas, II Nachmetaphysisches Denken 7-53 (2012); Wolfgang Schluchter, Die Entwicklung des okzidentalen Rationalismus (1979); Klaus Eder, Collective Learning Processes and Social Evolution: Towards a Theory of Class Conflict in Modern Society, 1 Tidskrift för Rätssociologi 23 (1983); Klaus Eder, Learning and the Evolution of Social Systems – An Epigenetic Perspective, in Evolutionary Theory in Social Science 101 (M. Schmid & F. M. Wuketits eds., 1987); Robert Bellah, Religion in Human Evolution – From the Paleolithic to the Axial Age (2011); Hauke Brunkhorst, Critical Theory of Legal Revolutions – Evolutionary Perspectives (forthcoming 2014). For social history, see Barrington Moore, Injustice – The Social Bases of Obedience and Revolt (1978). For the social-cognitive development of individual human beings, see Jean Piaget, The Moral Judgment of the Child (M. Gabain trans., 1968); Lawrence Kohlberg, Essays on Moral Development (1981/1984).Google Scholar

18 See, e.g., Dubiel, Helmut, Niemand ist frei von der Geschichte. Die nationalsozialistische Herrschaft in den Debatten des Deutschen Bundestages (1999).Google Scholar

19 See Eder, Klaus, Geschichte als Lernprozeß? Zur Pathogenese politischer Modernität in Deutschland (1985).Google Scholar

20 Brunkhorst, , supra note 17.Google Scholar

21 I am thankful for a controversial discussion with Rudolf Stichweh on this point at a conference that Marcelo Neves organized in Brasilia in September, 2013.Google Scholar

22 See https://www.marxists.org/history/ussr/sounds/lyrics/international.htm. The German text refers directly to human rights: “Die Internationale erkämpft das Menschenrecht.” This translates in English into: “The Intenationale fights for human rights.” (https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Die_Internationale#Deutscher_Text_.28Emil_Luckhardt.2C_1910.29).Google Scholar

23 Hegel, G. W. F., 12 Werke 32 (1970).Google Scholar

24 To be sure, all revolutionary advances are existing only because they are adapted. Nothing that is not adapted, exists. To be adapted, modern constitutions must fulfil functional requirements of structural coupling.Google Scholar

25 See Gould, Steven Jay, Darwinian Fundamentalism, 44 New York Review of Books 10 (1997); Steven Jay Gould & Richard C. Lewontin, The Spandrels of San Marco and the Panglossian Paradigm (April 4, 2012), available at: http://www.aaas.org/spp/dser/03_Areas/evolution/perspectives/Gould_Lewontin_1979.shtml.Google Scholar

26 Gould, Steven Jay, The Structure of Evolutionary Theory 26 (2002); Steven Jay Gould, A Developmental Constraint in Cerion, with Comments of the Definition and Interpretation of Constraint in Evolution, 43 Evolution 516, 517 (May, 1989). For an application to legal evolution, but without recognizing the normative character of constraints in the social evolution, see Marc Amstutz, Evolutorisches Wirtschaftsrecht 267-270 (2001).Google Scholar

27 See Brunkhorst, , supra note 17.Google Scholar

28 Somek, , supra note 7, at 8.Google Scholar

29 Kant, Immanuel, Streit der Fakultäten, XI Werke 361 (1977) (author's translation of the German phrase “vergessen sich nicht”).Google Scholar

30 Müller, Friedrich, “Wer ist das Volk? Eine Grundfrage der Demokratie” - Elemente einer Verfassungstheorie VI 56 (1997).Google Scholar

31 Berman, Harold, Law and Revolution. The Formation of the Western Legal Tradition (1983).Google Scholar

32 Pauline Kleingeld has argued in a recent essay, in the middle of the last decade of the 18th century Kant became more radical, cosmopolitan, egalitarian and republican than in his earlier writings. Pauline Kleingeld, Kant, Conflict, and Colonialism (paper presented at John Cabot University (Conference on Cosmopolitanism and Conflict), Rome, Oct. 13, 2013). The reasons seem to be (1) theoretical and (2) historical. First, in that time Kant worked out the consequences of his theoretical and practical philosophy for a theory of public and republican law, and he developed his ever more republican but modern (hence individualistic) theory of popular sovereignty. See Ingeborg Maus, Zur Aufklärung der Demokratietheorie (1992). Second, only after the victory of the Jacobean troops over the reactionary European coalition (1792), and after Jacobean rule and the beheading of the king (1792-1794), it became historically evident all over Europe that a modern republican regime (that is no longer monarchic) was empirically possible. Therefore, only then, after the final triumph of the revolution, did it become evident that the French Revolution was a Sign of History (Geschichtszeichen) that never ever will be forgotten. This was due to Jacobean rule and the trial against citoyen Louis Capet, and despite the moral and legal injustice of the trial against the sovereign who counterfactually represented the people (in a provisional state of law).Google Scholar

33 Kant, , supra note 29, at 361.Google Scholar

34 Hegel, G. W. F., Wissenschaft der Logik II 424 (1975). See Hegel, Lectures on the History of Philosophy, available at http://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/hegel/works/hp/hparistotle.htm.Google Scholar

35 Hegel, , supra note 34.Google Scholar

36 Marx, , supra note 9, at 101.Google Scholar

37 Id. at 97.Google Scholar

38 Delors, Jaques, Entwicklungsperspektiven der europäischen Gemeinschaft, B1 Aus Politik und Zeitgeschichte 3-9 (1993); Möller, Die Europäische Sozialunion, Lexikonartikel (manuscript 2013).Google Scholar

39 Marx, , supra note 9, at 101.Google Scholar

40 Habermas, Jürgen, II Theorie des kommunikativen Handelns 228 (1981); Armin Nassehi, Der soziologische Diskurs der Moderne 126-127 (2006).Google Scholar

41 Marx, Karl, Zur Judenfrage, in I Marx-Engels Studienausgabe 31-60 (1966).Google Scholar

42 Bofinger, Peter, Jürgen Habermas & Julian Nida-Rümelin, Kurswechsel für Europa. Einspruch gegen die Fassadendemokratie, Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung (August 3, 2012), available at http://www.faz.net/aktuell/feuilleton/debatten/europas-zukunft/kurswechsel-fuer-europa-einspruch-gegen-die-fassadendemokratie-11842820.html.Google Scholar

43 Koskenniemi, Martti, International Law in Europe: Between Tradition and Renewal, 16 European Journal of International Law 113, 122 (2005).Google Scholar

44 The functionalist language of reflection, copy, projection, recursion, system, code, program, and so on is philosophically problematic and philosophically much less advanced than those terms use in sociology. It still depends on the optical metaphor (see, e.g., Richard Rorty, Philosophy and the Mirror of Nature (1980)). In comparison the language of reciprocal, intersubjective and interactive understanding, of reciprocal role-taking and generalizing significant others that constitutes the social relation between Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, is much more compatible with modern pragmatist and linguistic philosophy (see Ernst Tugendhat, Selbstbewusstsein und Selbstbestimmung (1979)).Google Scholar

45 See Brandom, Robert, Making It Explicit: Reasoning, Representing & Discursive Commitment (1994).Google Scholar

46 Hegel, , supra note 34, at 59.Google Scholar

47 Koskenniemi, , supra note 5, 245. See Marx, supra note 41.Google Scholar

48 Tuori, Kaarlo, The Many Constitutions of Europe, in The Many Constitutions of Europe 3 (Kaarlo Tuori & Suvi Sankari eds., 2010).Google Scholar

49 I use European Union as a notion that covers both the former European Communities and the present European Union.Google Scholar

50 See Somek, , supra note 7. Even the present President of the European Commission, José Manuel Barroso of Portugal, owes his job to a late effect of the emancipation of Europe from fascism.Google Scholar

51 Thornhill, Chris, A Sociology of Constitutions. Constitutions and State Legitimacy in Historical-Sociological Persppective 327-71 (2011); John Erik Fossum & Augustín José Menéndez, The Constitution's Gift – A Constitutional Theory for a democratic European Union (2011). On the two basic ideas of a constitution (power-foundiung vs. power-limiting), see Hauke Brunkhorst, Solidarity – From Civic Friendship to the Global Legal Community 67 (2005); Christoph Möllers, Pouvoir Constituant – Constitution – Constitutionalization, in Developing a Constitution for European 131 (Erik O. Eriksen et al. eds., 2004).Google Scholar

52 For the German case, which was not exceptional, see Rainer Wahl, Verfassungsstaat, Europäisierung, InterNationalisierung (2003); Udo Di Fabio, Das Recht offener Staaten. Grundlinien einer Staats- und Rechtstheorie (1998).Google Scholar

53 Rossi, Ernesto & Spinelli, Altieri, Manifesto von Ventotene (August, 1941), available at http://www.europarl.europa.eu/brussels/website/media/Basis/Geschichte/bis1950/Pdf/Manifest_Ventotene.pdf (Das Manifest bringt “den Kern einer Zeitdiagnose zum Ausdruck, die damals die meisten politischen Kräfte des antifaschistischen Widerstands teilten.” Kolja Möller, Die Europäische Sozialunion (April 24, 2012), available at http://www.europa-in-bremen.de/fileadmin/user_upload/henmue/pdfs/EUDEinladung20120202_Moeller.pdf. But see Altiero Spinelli: From Ventotene to the European Constitution (Menéndez ed., Arena Report 1/2007).Google Scholar

54 But see Möller, supra note 53. Lutz Leisering hat ähnliche Beobachtungen generalisiert und gezeigt, daß der international welfarism der Entstehung des modernen Wohlfahrtsstaats vorhergegangen ist. See Lutz Leisering, Gibt es einen Weltwohlfahrtsstaat?, in Weltstaat und Weltstaatlichkeit 185 (Mathias Albert & Rudolf Stichweh eds., 2007). But see Ulrike Davy, The Rise of the Global “Social” - Origins and Transformations of Social Rights under UN Human Rights Law, 3 International Journal of Social Quality (2013). Die Bindung des Verfassungsgedankens an den Staat ist neueren Datums, unterschlägt aber die weit zurückreichende und auch noch für die Herausbildung von protodemokratischem National- (19. Jhd.) und demokratischem Sozialstaat (20. Jhd.) konstitutive Co-Evolution von kosmopolitischer und nationaler Konstitutionalisierung, wie neuere Studien zeigen. See Thornhill, supra note 51; Brunkhorst, The Co-evolution of Cosmopolitan and National Statehood -Preliminary Theoretical Considerations on the Historical Evolution of Constitutionalism, 47 Cooperation and Conflict 176 (2012); Brunkhorst, supra note 17.Google Scholar

55 Fossum, & Menéndez, supra note 51, at 80, 175. The only instance of a constitution of a founding member that made no declaration about Europe, the Constitution of Luxemburg, is of itself a revealing case. In this case, the Luxemburg Conseil d'Êtat decided in 1952 that the Constitution implicitly committed the representatives of the people to join the European Coal and Steel Community, and to strive for further European unification. It is argued that, even if the constitution of Luxemburg did not contain anything vaguely resembling a proto-European clause, the Conseil d'Êtat constructed its fundamental law along very similar lines. When reviewing the constitutionality of the Treaty establishing the Coal and Steel Community, the Conseil affirmed that Luxembourg, not only could, but also should, renounce certain sovereign powers if the public good so required. See Report on the 1952 judgment of the Conseil d'Êtat. Google Scholar

56 German Ordoliberals already in the early 1930s had “hijacked” the idea of an economic constitution from the political left, from Hugo Sinzheimer and Franz Neumann. See Kaarlo Tuori, Multi-Dimensionality of European Constitutionalism: The Many Constitutions of Europe, in The Many Constitutions of Europe 3, 16 (Kaarlo Tuori ed., 2010). The hijacking was organized by Franz Böhm.Google Scholar

57 See Streeck, Wolfgang, Zum Verhältnis von sozialer Gerechtigkeit und Marktgerechtigkeit 8 (unpublished e-manuscript of a lecture, Verona September 20, 2012).Google Scholar

58 Ernst-Joachim Mestmäcker, Einführung, in Wettbewerb und Monopolrecht 5, 9 (Franz Böhm ed.) (author's translation). The same argument seems to fit the present crisis. See Mestmäcker, Ordnungspolitische Grundlagen einer politischen Union, Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung (Nov. 9, 2012), at 12. In the same way Milton Friedman and the Chicago School argues that the main threat to political and economic freedom “arises out of democratic politics” and must be “defeated by political action.” See Gabriel A. Amond, Capitalism and Democracy, 24 Political Science and Politics 467 (September 1991).Google Scholar

59 Thanks to Willis Guerra Filho for this hint (in a discussion on a conference “Problemas Juridicos e Constitucionais da Sociedale Mundial,” Brasilia, September 18, 2013). For comparative points of view (investment law, Latin-America), see David Schneidermann, Compensating for Democracy's “Defects”: The Case of International Investment Law (paper given at the Workshop Conflict-Law Constituionalism v. Authoritarian Managerialism, Loccum October 7, 2013).Google Scholar

60 See Crouch, Colin, The Strange Non-Death of Neoliberalism (2011); Harm Scheppel, Free Movement of Capital and so called “Finacialism” (paper given at the Workshop Conflict-Law Constitutionalism v. Authoritarian Managerialism, Loccum October 7, 2013).Google Scholar

61 Kelsen, Hans, Demokratie und Sozialismus, in Demokratie und Sozialismus – Ausgewählte Aufsätze 170 (Norbert Leser ed.,). For an old but still brillant analysis and representation of Kelsens position, see Peter Römer, Die reine Rechtslehre Hans Kelsens als Ideologie und Ideologiekritik, 11 Politische Vierteljahresschrift 579 (1971).Google Scholar

62 Tuori, , supra note 56 (discussing a juridical constitution and the structural coupling of law and law).Google Scholar

63 Hitzel-Cassagnes, Tanja, Entgrenzung des Verfassungsbegriffs. Eine institutionentheoretische Rekonstruktion (2012); see Karen J. Alter, The European Court's Political Power, 19(3) West European Politics 458 (1996); Karen J. Alter, Who are the Masters of the Treaty?: European Governments and the European Court of Justice, 52 International Organization 121 (1998). On the perpective dependence of evaluating a legal system as fragmented or pluralized, see Christoph Möller, Fragmentierung als Demokratieproblem?, in Strukturfragen der Europäischen Union 150 (Claudio Franzius, Meyer, Franz C. Meyer, Jürgen Neyer eds., 2010).Google Scholar

64 Maus, See, supra note 32; Jürgen Habermas, Faktizität und Geltung (1997).Google Scholar

65 Weiler, J. H. H., To be a European citizen – Eros and civilisation, 4 Journal of European Public Policy 495, 503 (1997).Google Scholar

66 European Union Law, 5677 (Damian Chalmers, Gareth Davies, Giorgio Monti eds., 2010); see Claudio Franzius, Recht und Politik in der transnationalen Konstellation 87 (2012); Claudio Franzius, Besprechung von “Habermas, Die Verfassung Europas”, 52 Der Staat 317, 318 (2013); Claudio Franzius & Ulrich K. Preuß, Die Zukunft der europäischen Demokratie 16 (2012).Google Scholar

67 The example is from Brunkhorst, supra note 51, at 168.Google Scholar

68 Habermas, Jürgen, Zur Verfassung Europas – Ein Essay57 (2011).Google Scholar

69 See Sabine Frerichs, Gold or Guilt? Reconstructing the Moral Economy of Debt (paper given at the Workshop Conflict-Law Constituionalism v. Authoritarian Managerialism, Loccum October 7, 2013).Google Scholar

70 Tuori, , supra note 56.Google Scholar

71 See Dann, Phillip, Looking Through the Federal Lens: The Semi-Parliamentary Democracy of the EU, 5 Jean-Monnet Working Paper (2002); Jürgen Bast, Europäische Gesetzgebung – Fünf Stationen in der Verfassungsentwicklung der EU, IN Strukturfragen der Europäischen Union, supra note 63, at 173.Google Scholar

72 See Tuori, , supra note 56; Sonja Buckel, ‘Welcome to Europe‘ – Juridische Auseinandersetzungen um das Staatsprojekt Europa (2013).Google Scholar

73 Isabelle, Ley, Brünn betreibt die Parlamentarisierung des Primärrechts. Anmerkungen zum zweiten Urteil des tschechischen Verfassungsgerichtshofs zum Vertrag von Lissabon vom 3.11.2009, 65 Juristen-Zeitung 170 (2010).Google Scholar

74 Bogdandy, Armin von, The European Lesson for International Democracy: The Significance of Articles 9–12 EU Treaty for International Organizations, 23 European Journal of International Law 315, 317, 321-25, 333 (2012). With respect of the Maastricht-Amsterdam Treaty, and in particular the Constitutional Treaty that failed in 2005 but to a large extent is identical with the Lisbon Treaty, see Christian Callies, Das Demokratieprinzip im Europäischen Staaten- und Verfassungsverbund, in Internationale Gemeinschaft und Menschenrechte 399, 402-404 (Jürgen Bröhmer et al. eds., 2005).Google Scholar

75 See Mung-Sung Kuo, The Moment of Schmittian Truth: Conceiving of the State of Exception in Global Governance in the Waken of the Cyprus Bailout Crisis (paper given at the Workshop Conflict-Law Constitutionalism v. Authoritarian Managerialism, Loccum October 7, 2013).Google Scholar

76 Korpi, Walter, The Democratic Class Struggle (1983).Google Scholar

77 Claus Offe, Europe Entrapped – Does the EU have the Political Capacity to Overcome its Current Crisis? (unpublished manuscript 2013).Google Scholar

78 Streek, Wolfgang, Zum Verhältnis von sozialer Gerechtigkeit und Marktgerechtigkeit (unpublished manuscript of a Lecture Verona Sept. 20, 2012). See Kerry Rittich, Fragmented Work: Informality, Uneven Austerity and an Expanded Law of Work (paper given at the Workshop Conflict-Law Constitutionalism v. Authoritarian Managerialism, Loccum October 7, 2013).Google Scholar

79 Enderlein, Henrik, Grenzen der europäischen Integration? Herausforderungen an Recht und Politik, DFG-Rundgespräch in Zusammenarbeit mit der Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung Berlin (unpublished manuscript November 25, 2011).Google Scholar

80 Streeck, Wolfgang, Crises of Democratic Capitalism, 51 New Left Review 71 (2011). As a consequence, popular sovereignty has been fragmented and marginalized, beyond and within the national state, see Thore Prien, Fragmentierte Volkssouveränität (2010).Google Scholar

81 See Streek, Wolfgang & Mertens, Daniel, Politik im Defizit. Austerität als fiskalpolitisches Regime, MPIfG Discussion Papers 10/5, Köln 2010.Google Scholar

82 But now a European public exists, and we can observe first changes of opinion that are going in the direction of the following last sentence. See Paul Statham & Hans-Jörg Trenz, Understanding the Mechanisms of EU Politicization: Lessons from the Euro-zone Crisis (electronic paper, Kopenhagen 2013).Google Scholar

83 For early observations, see Hauke Brunkhorst, Zwischen internationaler Klassenherrschaft und egalitärer Konstitutionalisierung – Europas zweite Chance, in Anarchie der kommunikativen Freiheit 32-25 (2007).Google Scholar