This book uses constitutional analysis and theory to explore the transformation of Europe from the post-war era until the Euro-crisis. Authoritarian liberalism has developed over these years and, as the book suggests, is now perhaps reaching its limit. This book uses history and theory to reveal the EU's journey and highlight future challenges.

Michael A. Wilkinson is Associate Professor of Law at LSE. He has held visiting professorships at Cornell University, Paris II, the National University of Singapore, and the University of Keio. He teaches and researches in the areas of legal theory, constitutional theory and European integration. His recent publications include Questioning the Foundations of Public Law (Hart, 2018), Constitutionalism Beyond Liberalism (CUP, 2017), 'Beyond the Post-Sovereign State? On the Past, Present and Future of Constitutional Pluralism' (2019) Cambridge Yearbook of European Legal Studies, and 'The Material Constitution' (2018) Modern Law Review. His work has been translated into Portuguese, Italian, Spanish and Turkish.

• Introduction


• Part I - Interwar: A Pre-History of Authoritarian Liberalism


• 1: Authoritarian Liberalism in Late Weimar


• 2: Beyond Weimar: The Long Crisis of Liberalism, the Political Economy of the Interwar Conjuncture and the Foundations of Neo-Liberalism


• Part II - Postwar Europe: The Reconstitution of Inter-State, State-Society, and Social Relations


• 3: Restraining State Sovereignty: Imagining a 'European Germany'


• 4: De-Democratization of the Political Constitution


• 5: The Economic Constitution: Ordoliberalism, Neo-liberalism, and the De-Radicalization of Political Opposition


• Part III - The Road from Maastricht to Lisbon: Constitutional Movements and Counter-Movements


• 6: Restraining State Sovereignty or the Return of the German Question?


• 7: The Post-Sovereign Constitution or the Return of Sovereignty?


• 8: The Material Constitution: There is No Alternative...Or is There?


• Part IV - Euro-crisis: The Unfinished Conjuncture


• 9: Authoritarian Liberalism Writ Large: The Spectre of a 'German Europe'


• 10: The New Constitutionalism and its Discontents


• 11: The Material Constitution in Crisis: Telos, Nomos, and Demos


• Conclusion