Die Zukunft der Verfassung

The welfare state is straining the constitution. Designed for a state with entirely different tasks and resources, it is not equipped for welfare state activities and instruments, and it seems that constitutional amendments can only adjust it to a limited extent. If this observation holds true, it signifies nothing less than a threat to an achievement that has served for two hundred years as the most important means of limiting power and guiding politics in the interest of personal freedom. The increasing materialization of state tasks, along with the reduction of legal governance capacity and the diffusion of state power with its fragmentation of decision-making authority, compels the assumption that the constitution, despite its claims, is regressing to a partial order and is once again adopting characteristics of older, specific, and particular forms of governance. To the same extent that this change becomes apparent, the empirical constitution is likely to regain interest.