Recently, several Muslim countries have ratified new constitutions. In this paper, we ask two questions: first, whether Muslim influence has a discernible impact on the content of such constitutions and, second, whether it has an impact on constitutional reality. More precisely, we are...

Over 10 years ago, Feld and Voigt (2003) introduced the first indicator for objectively meas-uring the actual independence of the judiciary and demonstrated its utility in a large cross-section of countries. The indicator has been widely used, but also criticized. This paper pre-sents more...

Among economists, the view that precisely defined and reliably enforced property rights are generally conducive to economic growth has been quasi-unanimous. But recently, some authors have argued that the relationship is more complex than previously acknowledged: property rights reforms might,...

The author distinguishes between normative and positive constitutional economics. Taking the observation that the normative branch of the new discipline is much better developed that its positive counterpart as a starting point, the available positive literature is surveyed nevertheless. The...