ABSTRACT
The chapter attempts to identify the link between three phenomena that straddle law and politics: the rise of nationalist populism in Europe (especially in Central and Eastern Europe), the liberal concept of the rule of law, and the problem of the language of constitutionalism. The currently dominating framework of analysis focusing on mere compliance with the standards of the rule of law is insufficient to understand whether the nationalist upsurge is purely reactionary in relation to liberal constitutionalism as it operates in the EU, or whether it attempts to propose its own form of ‘illiberal’ constitutional language. The chapter argues that European nationalist populism does not yet have a definitive constitutional model. It rather parasitically feeds on the existing forms of liberal legality in order to produce a makeshift construction focused on executive power. It is deeply entangled in its permanent opposition to not only liberal constitutionalism as such, but also with the constitutional structure of the EU. For this reason, I argue that the tensions between CEE populist countries and the EU may be understood as a ‘European civil war’ waged in the legal arena.
