The "free democratic constitutional structure" and its enemies – law and authority in Germany

Abstract

The following article seeks to answer the question as to why there is such strong acceptance of "the law" as an authority in political debates. The recent conflict on  the so-called "Extremismusklausel"
(extremism clause) between anti-right-wing NGOs and the German Ministry of Familiy, Youth, Women an Social Affairs as well as the Saxonian Ministry of Interior provides some examples of the questions considered in the following theoretical essay. The
"extremism provision" requires NGOs that receive government funding in the work against "right wing extremism" to sign a clause stating that neither they nor any of their cooperation partners would give anyone cause to suspect them of "extremism". Here, the "free democratic constitutional structure" is evoked as the quintessence of the German legal system. A Derridian critique of the conflict on the "extremism clause" might argue that to require the signature is to demand the inevitable affirmation of the necessity of the law to be in force. "The Law" has an aporetical structure and auto-authorizes itself. This aporetical structure enables democracy "to come". But the default attempt to shield democracy from its presumed enemies by reducing it to the "free democratic constitutional structure" destroys this enabling abilitiy – it destroys democracy.