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This book discusses in what sense constitutional law has a political dimension, raising the question whether constitutional law is fundamentally political as to its validity, terms of its origin, conceptual structure and/or corresponding practice. It also poses the question whether that dimension is a political-theological dimension. A positive answer to these questions challenges the prevailing view that constitutional law is to be conceived strictly as law, moreover as written law, approved at a certain point in history by a particular power and interpreted as any other law by the judiciary. The essays included in this book, written by leading scholars in constitutional theory - including Martin Loughlin, Paul Kahn, Manon Altwegg-Boussac and Massimo La Torre - address these questions in a timely and original way.
List of contents
Introduction.- Part I.- Fundamental Law.- Fundamental Law.- Expanding Legality and Losing Fundamental Law: On Martin Loughlin's Dualist Conception of Public Law.- Part II.- A Political-Theological Dimension.- Decision and Legal Interpretation.- An Alternative Political Theology: The Negative and Anticipatory Significance of the Constitutive Concepts of Constitutional Law.- Part III.- Political Constitutional Law.- Informal Constitutional Change and Political Law.- "Liquid Constitutions" and Their Informal Changes.- Part IV The Problem of European "Constitutional Law".- A Functional Alternative to Political Right: Social Contract Withouta People.- In Capital We Trust: The Eurozone: A Congeries of Material Norms Without a Constitution?.- The Different Faces of Politics: Economic Governance and EuropeanDemocracy
About the author
Miguel Nogueira de Brito is Associate Professor at the University of Lisbon's School of Law and Coordinator for Constitutional Law at the Lisbon Centre for Research in Constitutional Law. His main research interests are Constitutional Law and Political Theory. His main works are "A Constituição Constituinte" and "A Justificação da Propriedade Privada numa Democracia Constitucional".
Luís Pereira Coutinho is Associate Professor at the University of Lisbon's School of Law. His research interests are Constitutional Law and Political Theory. His main works are "A Autoridade Moral da Constituição" and "Teoria dos Regimes Políticos". He edited "Eichmann and Jerusalem: 50 years after" and "Judicial Activism: An Interdisciplinary Approach to the American and European Experiences", the latter with Springer.
