BOOK: Ulrike MÜSSIG (ed.), Reconsidering Constitutional Formation I: National Sovereignty [Studies in the History of Law and Justice, ed. Georges MARYTN and Mortimer SELLARS,; 6]. Heidelberg/New York: Springer, 2016, 296 p. ISBN 978-3-319-42404-0

(image source: Springer)

 
Springer published an edited volume by Prof. Ulrike Müssig (Advanced Grantee of the ERC Chair of Civil Law, German and European Legal History, University of Passau) entitled Reconsidering Constitutional Formation I National Sovereignty. A Comparative Analysis of Juridification by Constitution.

Book abstract:

The Research project ReConFort, dealing with communication dependencies of historic constitutions, reconsiders the national constitutional discourses of the 19th century. Following the key category national sovereignty as tertium comparationis it became clear, that it was a distinctive feature of the 19th c.-Europe to loose ‘national borders’ and to accumulate the historic constitutional debates around central topoi and in cross-border correspondances of protagonists. So far we have identified the topoi national/constitutional sovereignty, precedence of constitution, accountability of politics and the judiciary as constituted power.

The volume includes essays of the PI and the Post-Docs.

Table of contents:

• Juridification by Constitution. National Sovereignty in the 18th and 19th c. Europe by Ulrike Müßig

• National sovereignty in the Belgian Constitution of 1831. On the meaning(s) of article 25 by Brecht Deseure

• The Omnipotence of Parliament in the legitimisation process of ‘representative government’ during the Albertine Statute (1848-1861)
  by Giuseppe Mecca

• Sovereignty Issue in the Public Discussion in the Era of the Polish 3rd of May Constitution by Anna Tarnowska

Furthermore , it provides the first English translation of the Statute "Our free Royal Cities in the States of Rzeczpospolita.

The book can be downloaded in open access here.