Publisher's Synopsis
Gijsbert Karel van Hogendorp, 1762-1834, is the auctor intellectualis of the Dutch Kingdom's first Constitution (1814). To his honour, the G.K. van Hogendorp Centre was founded in 1996 to promote research and teaching of European constitutional studies, thereby combining the disciplines of European and comparative constitutional law as well as legal and political theory. The Centre is supported by the faculties of Humanities and Law of the University of Amsterdam and by the European Union through the Jean Monnet project. The Hogendorp Centre hosts yearly international conferences on various topics, such as EMU (1997), Flexibility (1998), Ambiguity in the Rule of Law (1999), Europe's Constitution (2000) and Direct Effect (2001). From 2000 the publication of their proceedings is in the hands of Europa Law Publishing. Ambiguity in the Rule of Law was the theme of a colloquium organized by the Hogendorp Centre for European Constitutional Studies in Amsterdam in 1999. The discussion centered around the assumption that enhancing the Rule of Law at the international plane, e.g. by creating law-making and judicial bodies there, often affects the Rule of Law at the domestic plane. Particularly, within national states it would lead to a shift of authority away from the legislature to the executive. Several speakers from The Netherlands, Belgium, The United Kingdom, France and Germany tackled the theme from different angles, expressing thoughts not only on the dangers, but also on the positive effects of increasing international lawmaking on the Rule of Law.
