Political Insurance for the (Relative) Poor: How Liberal Constitutionalism Could Resist Plutocracy

Abstract

© 2019 Cambridge University Press. Fair value of equal political liberties is a key precondition for the legitimacy of a regime in liberal thought. This liberal guarantee is breached whenever a group is permanently or semi-permanently locked out of power. Given the convertibility, subtlety, and resilience of power, gross material inequality - produced by neoliberal economic policies - effectively locks the relative poor out of political power. Such lockout breaches the legitimacy constraint on a liberal constitutional democracy. Neoliberal democracies, sooner or later, become plutocracies. This possibility should concern not only liberal political theory but also liberal constitutionalism. T..