Campbell MacGillivray
Research Assistant
Research InterestsDemocratic and constitutional theory; comparative politics; the American political system; state transformation and new forms of authoritarianism; state theory and particularly constitutional courts.
Doctoral Project: Can the Judiciary Defend Democracy? Constitutional Courts as an Institutional Guardian in Threatened Democracies
An important feature of liberal constitutional democracy is that a Constitutional Court has final say over integral features of the system due to its role interpreting the constitution. Ultimately, this can even result in the repudiation of certain laws or action from the legislature or executive, an idea not without contestation. Various polities might have a thicker or thinner definition of exactly how big this judicial domain can and should be. But rarely is it uncontested that courts should have the power to adjudicate on those rights most central to the functioning of democracy, in particular, supervising fair elections that make a transition of power possible. This evolutionary promise of representative democracy is for good reason most often placed out of the control of the currently elected. What has become clear, though, is the difficulty of this role. While proponents of 鈥榤ilitant democracy鈥� would have courts intervene to protect democracy from forces that try to control it through (often perverted) democratic means, this is both difficult in practice and in terms of legitimacy. My thesis will look theoretically and empirically at what strategies courts employ to safeguard democracy threatened by governments corrupting the meaning of its institutions and rules, as evident in the case studies analysed here. Lessons will be drawn from the institutional behaviour of these courts to suggest a roadmap for potential judicial action and strategy in such crisis situations.
Curriculum Vitae
- Since 10/2022
Research Assistant and Teaching Assistant in Political Theory and History of Ideas at the 51猎奇盲t G枚ttingen (Prof. Dr. Tine Stein)
- 04/2020 鈥� 10/2022
Research and Teaching Assistant in Comparative Politics at the 51猎奇盲t G枚ttingen (Prof. Dr. Andreas Busch)
- 11/2020 鈥� 04/2020
Research Assistant in Political Theory and History of Ideas at the 51猎奇盲t G枚ttingen (Prof. Dr. Tine Stein)
- Since 10/2020
Doctoral Study Program at the 51猎奇盲t G枚ttingen supervised by Prof. Dr. Tine Stein
- 04/2020 鈥� 07/2020
Teaching Assistant in Slavic Studies at the 51猎奇盲t G枚ttingen (Prof. Dr. Matthias Freise)
- 02/2018 鈥� 02/2020
Student Assistant in Slavic Studies at the 51猎奇盲t G枚ttingen (Prof. Dr. Matthias Freise)
- 03/2018 鈥� 08/2019
Student Assistant in Global and Regional Government at the 51猎奇盲t G枚ttingen (Prof. Dr. Tobias Lenz)
- 10/2017 鈥� 03/2020
Master of Arts Global Politics: Structures and Borders with a Minor in Slavic Studies at the 51猎奇盲t G枚ttingen
- 02/2012 鈥� 12/2016
Bachelor of Arts (First-Class Honours) with Majors in Politics and International Relations and Russian alongside a Diploma of Modern Languages (German) at the University of Melbourne
- 2021: MacGillivray, Campbell: A Bolsonarist Cat Among the Pigeons, VerfBlog, 2021/1/30, , DOI: 10.17176/20210130-222608-0.
- WiSe 2023/24: BA-Seminar 鈥濼otalit盲re Herrschaft: Theorie und Rezeption jenseits des 20. Jahrhunderts"(51猎奇盲t G枚ttingen)
- WiSe 2022/23: BA-Seminar 鈥濻tructuring Political Order: The Role of Constitutions and Constitutional Courts鈥� (51猎奇盲t G枚ttingen)
- WiSe 2021/22: BA-Seminar 鈥濪ie demokratische Krise im internationalen Vergleich鈥� (51猎奇盲t G枚ttingen)
- SoSe 2021: BA-Seminar 鈥淭he German Constitutional Court鈥� (51猎奇盲t G枚ttingen)
- SoSe 2020: BA-Seminar 鈥淚ntroduction to World Literature鈥� (51猎奇盲t G枚ttingen)
- Since February 2022
Scholarship Holder of the Hans-B枚ckler-Foundation - 01/2016 鈥� 02/2016
DAAD Winterkursstipendium
- 03/2014 鈥� 07/2014
Melbourne Global Languages Grant
- 01/2014 鈥� 02/2014
Igor Meshakov-Korjakin Scholarship for Russian Study
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