Over- and Under- Constitutionalization as Democratic Problems

Overconstitutionalization is a very important, but little noticed source of the European democracy deficit. Yet, overconstitutionalization is not limited to the European Union. It also happens in states and forms a threat to democracy there as well. It shifts powers from the democratically legitimized and accountable institutions to the judiciary. Like overconstitutionalization, underconstitutionalization is also possible and tends to threaten democracy in a different way. While overconstitutionalization is mainly a European problem, underconstitutionalization rather seems to be a problem for the United States. The lecture will try to explain these problems.

Dieter Grimm is a professor emeritus at Humboldt University Berlin and a Permanent Fellow of the Wissenschaftskolleg zu Berlin, whose director he was from 2001 to 2007. From 1987 to 1999 he served as Justice of the Federal Constitutional Court of Germany, where he was the judge rapporteur for matters concerning freedom of speech and freedom of the media (among others). From 2002 to 2017, Dieter Grimm taught, next to his obligations in Berlin, also at the Yale Law School. He holds honorary doctoral degrees from various German and foreign universities and is a member of several academies, among them the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.