Norms, Interests, and Values

All constitutional regimes necessarily rely on a certain underlying consensus (Robert Dahl). They all, however, include conflicts and mechanisms to cope with them. This ambiguity applies in particular to the normative fundament of the political system, the constitutional basic order. If the balance between conflict and consent and its reproduction by relevant stakeholders and constitutional institutions including the judicial adjustment of the constitutional text by interpretation is disturbed here, or the constitutional basic order itself is threateningly assailed, constitutional crisis will emerge. Thus, experiences of constitutional crisis, but also processes of constitution making and constitutional reform, mark those dimensions in which consent and conflict in the constitutional basic order are reflected most clearly and fundamentally. The volume collects contributions dealing with constitutional regimes which are currently facing critical challenges of the underlying consent of the constitutional community (Belgium, Hungary, Italy, Malaysia, Taiwan, Turkey), with strategies of the constitutional order to cope with those challenges (Germany, Singapore), and with claimed cultural differences concerning the Western form to shape the constitutional basic order ("Asian Values" and constitution).