The chapter answers the question ‘Why has the rule of law become so fragile?’ as set up by the 2023 Nine Dots Prize competition. It shows how the liberal narrative of the rule of law is built on repressing the political elements of the legal system. Using Jungian psychoanalysis to analyse the crises of the rule of law, the author shows that the more we repress democratic politics from the legal system, the more the politics will strike back as ‘shadow’ in a distorted, anti-democratic form. The chapter also deepens the analysis of how DWE works politically with anger, preventing it from turning into ‘free-floating rage’ that can be exploited by authoritarian populism. It introduces the notion of ‘critical feeling’ to complement ‘critical thinking’ in contemporary academia.

The chapter explains the legal and political strategy of DWE, showing how the movement managed to organise and win a referendum to expropriate corporate landlords. It shows how the movement employs popular anger as a source of energy to transform the system towards the common good. It explains the concept of legal fiction and shows how it can influence reality. It also explains the methodology and challenges of action research.

The chapter explains the context of writing the Grundgesetz (the German Constitution). It introduces Article 15 which allows to ‘socialise’ land (and housing) and turn it into democratically managed commons. It also shows how the notion of ‘misuse of economic power’, an important context in which Article 15 was written into the Grundgesetz, gains a new meaning today.

An epilogue story that is a rewrite of Franz Kafka, ‘Before the Law’, using the DWE referendum as its topic.

A prologue that introduces Deutsche Wohnen & Co. Enteignen and narrates its story in the context of other radical democratic movements, most prominently the Polish Solidarność, a mass democratic movement that led to overthrowing of authoritarian communism in Poland.

The chapter presents a vision of Berlin after socialisation of housing, as proposed by DWE. It details the organisational structure of a new institution (Anstalt öffentlicher Rechts) that would manage this housing democratically. It explains the legal rules for calculating the compensation to the expropriated landlords. It also compares the non-profit-oriented architecture with the ‘architecture of financialisation’: the housing built by the corporate landlords.

The chapter discusses the history of the Berlin housing system, the Kantian roots of the German Constitution (Grundgesetz) and the events leading to the emergence of Deutsche Wohnen & Co. enteignen (DWE). It explains the origins of the liberal notion of property and how corporate property is premised on ‘blasting the atom of property open’, that is, destroying the links between person and a thing that constitute classical liberal understanding of property.