Entrenchment works by capturing politics’ basic ground rules.

Evidence

Similarly focused on the problem of entrenchment, Samuel Issacharoff and Richard Pildes emphasize the need to maintain political competition and to guard against “political lockups” perpetrated by “existing holders of political power [who] seek to perpetuate their control … by capturing the basic structures and ground rules of politics itself.” As Pildes elaborates, judicial intervention is justified “whenever self-interested political actors employ political power to insulate themselves from the political competition required to make electoral accountability meaningful.” — Daryl Levinson and Benjamin I. Sachs, Political Entrenchment and Public Law, 117

Categorization

• DEFINE: ‘Political lockup’ names the mechanism by which incumbents make the rules of the game self-serving — an essential contrast case for ideology embedded in law.
• XREF: connects to: Entrenchment means past decision makers asymmetrically constrain future political choices. — Daryl Levinson and Benjamin I. Sachs, Political Entrenchment and Public Law, 486; Entrenchment pervades democratic politics far beyond legislative and election rules — Daryl Levinson and Benjamin I. Sachs, Political Entrenchment and Public Law, 536; Some political entrenchment is deliberately designed, not merely incidental — Daryl Levinson and Benjamin I. Sachs, Political Entrenchment and Public Law, 202 (+8 more)

Broader Connections

• Political entrenchment operates through informal and coercive means, not only formal legal rules #expands (0.85) — Daryl Levinson and Benjamin I. Sachs, Political Entrenchment and Public Law, 48
• Entrenchment can be functional, via empowered constituencies, not only formal legal rules #expands (0.84) — Daryl Levinson and Benjamin I. Sachs, Political Entrenchment and Public Law, 370
• Functional political entrenchment works without changing formal legal rules #exemplifies (0.83) — Daryl Levinson and Benjamin I. Sachs, Political Entrenchment and Public Law, 173
• Political actors entrench power through functional mechanisms as readily as formal legal rules #expands (0.82) — Daryl Levinson and Benjamin I. Sachs, Political Entrenchment and Public Law, 42
• Substantive policy choices produce entrenchment just as formal rule changes do #expands (0.82) — Daryl Levinson and Benjamin I. Sachs, Political Entrenchment and Public Law, 2
• Political entrenchment means making political change more difficult than it otherwise would be #qualifies (0.80) — Daryl Levinson and Benjamin I. Sachs, Political Entrenchment and Public Law, 47
• Policies entrench by reshaping who holds political power. #expands (0.79) — Daryl Levinson and Benjamin I. Sachs, Political Entrenchment and Public Law, 194
• Some political entrenchment is deliberately designed, not merely incidental #expands (0.78) — Daryl Levinson and Benjamin I. Sachs, Political Entrenchment and Public Law, 202
• Entrenchment can serve public ends like precommitment and stability, not just self-serving power #qualifies (0.71)