The Constitutional Protection of CapitalismIn 1945 a Labour government deployed Britain's national autonomy and parliamentary sovereignty to nationalise key industries and services such as coal, rail, gas and electricity, and to establish a publicly-owned National Health Service. This monograph argues that constitutional constraints stemming from economic and legal globalisation would now preclude such a programme. It contends that whilst no state has ever, or could ever, possess complete freedom of action, nonetheless the rise of the transnational corporation means that national autonomy is now siginificantly restricted. The book focuses in particular on the way in which these economic constraints have been nurtured, reinforced and legitimised by the creation on the part of world leaders of a globalised constitutional law of trade and competition. This has been brought into existence by the adoption of effective enforcement machinery, sometimes embedded within the nation states, sometimes formed at transnational level. With Britain enmeshed in supranational economic and legal structures from which it is difficult to extricate itself, the British polity no longer enjoys the range and freedom of policymaking once open to it. Transnational legal obligations constitute not just law but in effect a de facto supreme law entrenching a predominantly neoliberal political settlement in which the freedom of the individual is identified with the freedom of the market. The book analyses the key provisions of WTO, EU and ECHR law which provide constitutional protection for private enterprise. It dwells on the law of services liberalisation, public monopolies, state aid, public procurement and the fundamental right of property ownership, arguing that the new constitutional order compromises the traditional ideals of British democracy. |
Contents
| 1 | |
2 The World Trade Organisation and the Sanctity of Private Enterprise | 47 |
A Faithful Expression of the Capitalist Ideal? | 82 |
Property as a Human Right | 128 |
5 Neoliberalism as the Constitution | 152 |
| 165 | |
| 183 | |
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Common terms and phrases
accepted accord accountability adopt Agreement application argued argument authority balance become bodies Britain British capitalism choice Commission commitments Community compensation competition conception considered constitutional contestability contrast Convention corporations Council countries Court create decisions democracy democratic direct domestic economic policy effect enforcement enterprise entrenchment established European existence fact favour force free trade freedom fundamental GATT give global globalisation human rights idea ideological important institutions interests international law interpretation involved judicial Labour legislation limited majority matter means measures Member movement nature negotiations neoliberal objective obligations organisation ownership Parliament particular Party political possible principle procedure property rights protection question reason regard regulation remains require rules sector social sovereignty tion trade transnational transnational regimes Treaty Union United whilst
Bibliographic information
| Title | The Constitutional Protection of Capitalism |
| Author | Danny Nicol |
| Publisher | Bloomsbury Publishing, 2010 |
| ISBN | 1847315593, 9781847315595 |
| Length | 220 pages |
| Subjects | › Law / Constitutional |
| Export Citation | BiBTeX EndNote RefMan |