Hermann Heller and the "Polemical Principle" of Democracy

• In Event: Democracy and the Rule of Law: Lessons from the Weimar Republic

Abstract

Hermann Heller stands out among Weimar-era jurists and theorists of the state for his defense of social democracy and his ethically non-neutral arguments for the rule of law, a key tenet of liberalism. At the same time, in his 1934 magnum opus Theory of the State, Heller claims that the principle of democratic sovereignty is a polemical principle which, as such, can only be understood in opposition to the monarchical principle. This paper explores the meaning of Heller’s description of democratic sovereignty as a polemical principle by contextualizing it within the theory of state sovereignty that Heller defends in 1927 book Sovereignty. Whereas Heller’s account of state sovereignty indicates that sovereignty is a property of the state as a whole and not a property of any part or organ of the state, Heller’s practical support for democratic sovereignty, the paper argues, stems from his early recognition of the need for a counterweight to tendencies towards dictatorship in the interwar period. Accordingly, the paper sheds new light on the relationship between Heller’s theoretical account of sovereignty and his practical political activities in support of Weimar’s republican constitutional order.

Author

• Joseph Clarkson, University of Notre Dame