The chapter analyses how the climate change action plan developed by the European Central Bank (ECB) as part of its monetary policy strategy review in 2020-2021 is aligned with the ECB’s mandate set out in the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union and the Treaty on European Union. The Treaties require the ECB to integrate climate change considerations into its monetary policy and to contribute to the EU’s objectives regarding climate change, as established by Regulation (EU) 2021/1119, the European Climate Law. However, there are also legal limits on the action the ECB can take in this field. The chapter examines the key measures proposed as part of the plan from a legal perspective, including measures related to macroeconomic forecasts and models, the collection of statistical information for climate change risk analysis, the enhancement of risk assessment capabilities, asset purchase programmes, and possible changes to the collateral framework. It also considers the questions regarding the ECB’s democratic legitimacy and accountability that arise in this context.

Chapter 10 offers a summary of the structure, methodology, and findings of the book. It highlights the interdisciplinary nature of the investigation, in particular how a philosophically grounded argument can bear upon the reasoning of the Court while simultaneously addressing a pressing societal challenge.

Abstract: In this chapter, the authors delve into the context of cybersecurity and explore the concept of security mindset in relation to cyber education and John Dewey’s “democratic ideal.” The chapter proposes John Dewey’s robust theory of habit in Human Nature and Conduct (1922) as a grounding foundation for conceptualizing a core component of security mindset, namely the human capacity for intelligent adaptation and growth within ever-changing environments. In submitting this linkage between Dewey’s conception of habit and security mindset, the author’s purpose is more than to advance Deweyan habit as an intelligible enrichment to current cybersecurity ideas for how to manage threats. Going further, they forward the connection between Deweyan habit and security mindset to extend the kind of foundation necessary for advancing cybersecurity’s ability to meet diverse and evolving cybersecurity threats through cyber education. With this, a process of disruption that leads to the subsequent reorganization of habit can bring into view simultaneously the threats to democracy as well as the process of democracy itself.

At first glance, Hans Kelsen (1881–1973) remains a marginal figure within US political discourse. However, this chapter argues that revisiting Kelsen is crucial if we are to understand present-day intellectual tendencies supportive of autocratic threats to US democracy. A neglected, yet pivotal, anti-Kelsenian moment proves decisive among influential right wing intellectuals, so-called ‘west coast’ Straussians based at California’s Claremont Institute, who enthusiastically supported Donald Trump and embraced his authoritarianism. The lawyer and Claremont affiliate John Eastman, for example, worked to prevent a peaceful transfer of power to then President-elect Joe Biden in 2020 to keep Trump in power. Trump’s Claremont Institute defenders have absorbed crucial facets of Leo Strauss’s critical rejoinder to Kelsen: Strauss’ longstanding anti-Kelsenianism has morphed into their subterranean anti-Kelsenianism. To validate this claim, the chapter revisits Strauss’ complicated theoretical dialogue with Kelsen, while also highlighting crucial moments in the arcane history of postwar American Straussianism. What is gained theoretically, and not just historically or politically, by doing so? The Claremont Institute’s apologetics for Trump corroborate Kelsen’s worries that attempts to revive natural law under contemporary conditions invite autocracy.

Contemporary constitutional theorists typically assume that a system of constitutional adjudication inevitably stands in tension with a majoritarian understanding of democracy. Kelsen’s influential defence of constitutional review, by contrast, goes along with an affirmation of a procedural and majoritarian understanding of democracy. Did Kelsen fail to spot the supposed conflict between constitutional review and democracy? Or did he identify a solution to the counter-majoritarian difficulty? Michel Troper has vigorously argued that Kelsen’s defence of constitutional review is confused and fails to cohere with his conception of democracy. This chapter defends Kelsen’s argument for constitutional review against Troper’s charges. It argues both that Kelsen’s case for constitutional review is fundamentally sound and that it carries the potential to make an important contribution to contemporary debates on the legitimacy of judicial control of constitutionality. Kelsen’s argument for constitutional review offers a compelling case for constitutional review that focuses on the conditions of the proper functioning of electoral democracy rather than on the protection of liberal rights.

The response describes initiatives at the University of Cambridge Primary School (UCPS) and Laborschule Bielefeld in Germany that promote democracy education and provide children with the tools and opportunities to engage meaningfully in democratic processes. At UCPS, a Children’s Congress allows students to participate in school decision-making processes, a collaboration with academic researchers sought to understand how children think and feel about their disenfranchisement and a democracy curriculum teaches children key concepts and empowers them to form their own opinions and articulate them effectively. Laborschule Bielefeld focuses on peaceful conflict resolution as a foundation for democratic education. It uses the concept of ‘nonviolent communication’ to teach children how to express their feelings and needs constructively.

This manifesto advocates for granting voting rights to children, emphasising that voting is a right of citizenship, not a privilege of competence, and should be extended to all, regardless of age. It asserts that excluding children from the democratic process is unjust and impractical. It challenges common arguments against child enfranchisement, arguing that concerns about children’s competence, potential policy chaos and the sequencing of rights are flawed. It underscores the principle of political equality, highlighting that children, like adults, possess inherent moral value and unique perspectives deserving of respect and representation. Furthermore, it contends that enfranchising children would offer them much-needed political protection, ensuring their needs and concerns are considered in policy decisions.

This chapter characterizes the evolution and politicization of corporate regulation in Nigeria and crafts a theory of professional interest group politics in Nigeria. The chapter outlines how corporate regulation in Nigeria was politicized during the era of Ibrahim Babangida’s Structural Adjustment Program. In particular, the drafting process of the Companies Decree of 1990 provided a previously unparalleled opportunity for independent manufacturing, services, professional, and labor organizations to contest the revision of the most fundamental provisions of Nigerian corporate law. Informed by this history, the chapter advances a novel theory of professional interest groups in Nigerian politics, which are industry-based organizations that seek to advance their policy objectives at the federal level. Drawing their membership from across traditional regional, ethnic, and class boundaries, they are internally hierarchical and their less-prominent members also benefit from the achievement of shared regulatory objectives. Nigerian professional interest groups exercise a tangible influence over federal policy and its implementation.

In Tongoane v National Minister for Agriculture and Land Affairs, the Constitutional Court of South Africa ruled that the government’s attempt to regulate property in traditional communities through the Communal Land Rights Act (CLARA) was unconstitutional. It emphasised that traditional land was already governed by indigenous ‘living law’ and CLARA sought to replace this vernacular law, a system evolved over time, with legislation. This highlighted the presence of indigenous law predating colonialism, challenging colonial notions like ‘lex nullius’ (no law) and ‘terra nullius’ (empty land), which denied indigenous Africans their rights. This chapter argues that South Africa’s post-apartheid constitutional vision fails to fully recognise and integrate this vernacular law, undermining true transformation, and instead advocates for ‘Alter-Native Constitutionalism’, which would amalgamate ‘customary’, ‘common’ and vernacular law to reflect the realities and normative convictions of most South Africans. This approach aims to rectify historical injustices and create a more just legal system, rooted in indigenous values and addressing social and economic inequities. Explicating the indigenously feminist decolonising concept of Alter-Native Constitutionalism, the chapter calls for reconstitution of South Africa’s legal framework and content to give full voice to indigenous world-sense and law-sense, advocating a shift away from Eurocentric logics and norms.

This chapter explores the relationship between Hans Kelsen’s philosophical relativism and his theory of democratic leadership. First, it argues that Kelsen’s theory of democratic leadership cannot be fully understood unless placed within his broader political thought, which includes a commitment to philosophical relativism. Second, it suggests that Kelsen provided an original answer to the puzzle of democratic leadership that is significant in its own right. Writing during the rise of fascism, Nazism, and Soviet communism, Kelsen made a crucial distinction between autocratic and democratic forms of leadership: while autocratic leaders are seen as possessing absolute knowledge and, therefore, hold unlimited power, democratic leaders are thought to carry only relative truths, and their power is consequently limited. Kelsen demonstrated that if we believe moral absolutes exist, it is logical to have an absolute leader with unfettered power. In contrast, if we hold that moral absolutes are inaccessible to human knowledge and only relative truths exist, it follows that leaders should have limited power and be subject to constant scrutiny and control. Contrary to the common characterisation of Kelsen as an abstract and idealist thinker, this chapter shows that his approach to political leadership was normative yet realist. Rather than eliminating leadership, Kelsen associated democracy with multiple, temporary leaders who have limited and relative political power.

This chapter explores the origins, nature, and persistence of Cold War liberalism in U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East by analyzing the writings and policies of U.S. Secretary of State John Foster Dulles (1953–59). Dulles was both a pivotal and archetypal figure in the history of U.S.–Middle East relations. The chapter posits three pillars of Cold War liberalism that, with some variation, have undergirded U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East since Dulles’ tenure. First, the United States is preoccupied with the establishment of a global order predicated on a preponderance of American power. This is not a “rules-based” order but rather one upheld by security alliances constructed to advance America’s perceived interests, often in defiance of international laws or norms. Second, Cold War liberalism’s raison d’être is couched in and sometimes shaped by discourses of freedom and self-determination. Third, rhetorical commitments to promoting democracy notwithstanding, Cold War liberalism fuels skepticism, even hostility, toward genuine expressions of democracy and mass politics in the Middle East. Finally, the chapter argues that Cold War liberalism in the Middle East is not limited chronologically to the Cold War. All three pillars have Wilsonian antecedents and continue to shape US–Middle East relations.

Abraham Lincoln hoped to generate sufficient Whig support for his opposition to Kansas-Nebraska to get him elected to the senate in 1855. But that support failed to materialize, and in 1856, as the Whig party sank lower and lower under the burden of its own divisions, Lincoln joined a new anti-slavery party, the republicans, a coalition of northern Whigs and disgusted northern democrats. He ran against Stephen a. Douglas for the senate in 1858, and together they staged a memorable series of seven debates across Illinois. Douglas won the election, but Lincoln won a national reputation as an enemy of slavery's extension.

This chapter explores anti-utopian satire in bestselling British author Terry Pratchett’s Discworld series. Like the anti-chivalric satire of Cervantes, Shakespeare, and Voltaire, the Discworld books celebrate pragmatism and local knowledge rather than political ideals. The Discworld is alive with vivid utopian impulses, however, the chapter argues that they frequently lack concrete detail. Pratchett is more concerned with constructing a colourful world of humour, heroism, and villainy. The Ankh-Morpork books reflect on the processes of historical change, accelerating a medieval city-state into liberal industrial modernity via an array of fantastically estranged forms. The city itself, however, fails to actualise into a utopian vision of the future. Rather, Pratchett’s fantasy series articulates a deep suspicion of the kind of political radicalism often associated with utopian thinking. Through a close reading of two books in the series, Night Watch (2002) and Making Money (2007), the chapter considers how Pratchett’s fantasy world laments structural violence whilst lampooning utopian remedies to such violence, such as democratic elections, trade unions, industrial action, or new kinds of post-capitalist value.

This chapter discusses the frequency of stasis at Thebes. In contrast to existing scholarship, which focuses exclusively on cases that can be diagnosed with (near) certainty, it estimates the total number of staseis that occurred. This approach frees me to think probabilistically and thus factor into my analysis events that probably involved stasis, contextual factors that increased the likelihood of stasis, and – most significantly – the knowledge, acquired in Chapters 5 and 6, that the absence of evidence for stasis cannot be interpreted as evidence of absence except in a tiny minority of the polis-years under consideration. Through comprehensive analysis of the relevant evidence, it argues that Thebes experienced between 17 and 23 staseis during the fifth and fourth centuries; and thus that the Thebans experienced stasis at an average rate of between once every 8 and once every 11 years.