Framing and Diagnosing the Constitutional Degradation: a Comparative Perspective

The purpose of the research project is to study, through the methodology of comparative constitutional law and studies, the phenomenon of the deterioration of the structure and substance of the constitutional liberal democracy, which has taken place in the past decade worldwide.
By exploring and comparing several national experiences, in countries that have generally been regarded as consolidated democracies, the project will frame the conceptual boundaries of the “constitutional degradation”, filling an important gap in social sciences. As degradation is more difficult to detect than traditional authoritarian threats, the project will also develop a checklist with a systemic approach to the problems, in order to capture the interaction effects of apparently innocuous changes and to diagnose the degradation.
The research will be carried out by four research units through the establishment of working groups made up by members of each unit and foreign scholars, selected according to the role that each unit is expected to play and on the basis of already existing cooperation agreements and networks.