Authoritarianism

Why do authoritarian states create constitutions? Is it enough to simply brush them aside as mere façades or a »constitution without a constitutional culture«? No, it is not, says Günter Frankenberg, and shows in his latest book that, as texts written for a public, they need to be taken seriously as well as criticised.

Participation as complicity, power as private property, and the cult of directness as essential features of authoritarian constitutionalism abet the imaginary community of rulers and the ruled and shape the different variants of authoritarian constitutional practice – from fascism through kleptocracy and patrimonial systems through populism.

»Why do authoritarian regimes bother with a constitution? This book pursues this seeming paradox with deep theoretical insight and broad empirical reach. The result is an indispensable guide to understanding the emerging varieties of authoritarianism and the magical allure that constitutions offer autocrats and democrats alike. This book also holds a mirror back to liberal constitutional regimes illuminating their colonial, ethnocentric, violent and parochial features to which they may have become ›comfortably numb.‹« Alvaro Santos, Georgetown University Law Center, US

»›The good therapist fights darkness and seeks illumination, while romantic love is sustained by mystery and crumbles upon inspection.‹ If Irving Yolem is Love’s executioner, Günter Frankenberg is Authoritarianism’s executioner. Rather than romanticizing or despising authoritarian regimes, he deconstructs their authority, technology and power to reveal their deepest pathologies. In departing from the comparative constitutional orthodoxy, obsessed with constitutional backsliding to restore liberal legalism, Frankenberg exposes the existential pain and anxiety of liberals and warns them about their complicity in authoritarianism.« Fernanda G. Nicola, Washington College of Law, American University, US