Lon Fuller’s fictional Purple Shirt regime, Victor Orbán’s illiberal democracy in today’s Hungary and the Kaczynski brothers’ recently ended unconstitutional republic of Poland are three examples of a ‘broken democratic polity’ in which many aspects of the rule of law and constitutional democracy have been compromised and cannot be fixed without a qualified majority, even if democratic forces come to power. In this article, I address the question of whether illegal state action of a democratic government is an appropriate means of restoring legitimacy to what I call a ‘broken’ polity. Put differently: Is it morally defensible for a new democratically elected government to override and replace the rules of illiberal constitutional reform in violation of formal legality? If so, under what conditions? I argue that a positive answer to this question is justified if we adopt a neo-republican approach to politics and legitimacy.

There are two contrasting claims regarding the Hungarian judiciary. The Government asserts that it is in the best shape, while many other voices label it as captured or dependent. This article shows how both of these claims can be true, depending on the interplay between formality and informality and shows how a few small loopholes allow some actors to rig the judicial system. Therefore, the Hungarian judiciary is similar to Schrödinger’s cat, which is claimed to be dead and alive at the same time.

The synergy between formality and informality requires a network of a handful of trusted people in managerial positions to administer case allocation, promotion, and disciplinary systems, which seem to be very effective tools. Few small technical loopholes and some special remedies suffice to micromanage important cases precisely because key positions are captured which work as gatekeepers or emergency brakes. Most of these tools are legal in a very formal technical sense of the word because they rely on acts of Parliament. A formal legalism, a very thin understanding of the Rule of law, and a majoritarian mindset serve as a legitimizing ideology for the whole legal system.

How should the constitutional reform in Israel be assessed in comparative terms? Comparative constitutional understandings point to the centrality of three key sets of norms as part of the ‘democratic minimum core’: (i) commitments to free and fair, regular multi-party elections; (ii) political rights and freedoms; and (iii) a system of institutional checks and balances necessary to maintain (i) and (ii). Any change in judicial power and independence must be assessed against the benchmark of the democratic minimum core, and by reference to its cumulative practical effect on a system of institutional checks and balances.

We claim that recent changes in Israel may already threaten these institutional checks, and have the potential to do more damage in the future, if given broad effect and if combined with further changes in the power and independence of the Supreme Court. On this basis, we suggest, the relevant changes should be viewed as either ‘abusive’ or ‘proto-abusive’ in nature. By threatening to undermine both the power and independence of the Supreme Court of Israel, they directly threaten the health of the constitutional checks and balances system and, hence, the ‘democratic minimum core’ in Israel.

This brief essay contrasts two modes of constitutional change: abusive constitutional projects that seek to erode democracy and restorative constitutional projects that aim to repair eroded democratic constitutional orders. Constitutional democracies are eroded and restored via the same mechanisms: formal processes of constitutional amendment and replacement, legislative amendment, changes to executive policies and practices (or respect for conventions), and processes of judicial decision-making. Under the right conditions, abusive uses of these mechanisms for antidemocratic ends can be reversed by prodemocratic or restorative uses. The more difficult question is what kinds of political discourses are most likely to sustain successful processes of democratic rebuilding. In recent work, we have pointed to the role sometimes played by liberal democratic discourses as purported justifications for processes of abusive constitutional change: we label this the rise of “abusive constitutional borrowing.” Less well understood are the kind of discourses likely to sustain successful democratic healing or rebuilding. Often, the most popular discourse is a restorative one, which focuses on repairing damage caused by authoritarians and returning to a constitutional status quo ante. In this essay, we discuss the advantages and disadvantages of restorative constitutionalism as a response to prior episodes of democratic erosion.

The unconstitutional constitutional amendment doctrine has emerged as a highly successful, albeit still controversial, export in comparative constitutional law. The doctrine has often been defended as protecting a delegation from the people to the political institutions that they created. Other work has noted the doctrine’s potential utility in guarding against abusive constitutionalism. In this article, we consider how these justifications fare when expanded to encompass claims against the original constitution itself, rather than a later amendment to the text. That is, beyond the unconstitutional constitutional amendment doctrine, can or should there be a doctrine of an unconstitutional constitution? Our question is spurred by a puzzling 2015 case from Honduras where the Supreme Court held an unamendable one-term limit on presidential terms, as well as protective provisions punishing attempts to alter that limit, to be unconstitutional. What is particularly striking about the case is that these provisions were not later amendments to the constitution, but rather parts of the original 1982 constitution itself. Thus, this article examines the possibility of ‘an unconstitutional constitution’, what we predict to be the next trend in global constitutionalism.

This article focuses on the adoption of temporary measures within the generally rigid constitutional sphere. Commentators frequently contemplate the extent to which temporary constitutional measures are adequate and necessary within a constitution that is meant to be perpetuated. Some writers are in favour of temporary constitutionalism, claiming that it allows flexibility and relieves the counter-majoritarian problem. Others emphasise the devastating impact of intense implementation of temporary measures on the status and legitimacy of the constitution.

The article contends that as beneficial as temporary constitutionalism may be in some circumstances, its use should be scrutinised with great suspicion, especially when it is employed in weak constitutional regimes. In outlining the history of temporary constitutionalism in the State of Israel, the article illustrates how temporary constitutional amendments can be harnessed to undermine the democratic order. The Israeli use of temporary constitutionalism since 2009 reveals a new under-explored manifestation of ‘abusive constitutionalism’, referred to here as ‘abusive temporary constitutionalism’. With abusive temporary constitutionalism, incumbents can entrench their power against their opponents while avoiding both public accountability and judicial review of their actions. Drawing on the Israeli experience, the article outlines several signifiers (i.e. distinctive markers) which will allow judges in the future to monitor and suppress the development of the abusive employment of temporary constitutional amendments.