Hayek proposed constitutions to anchor economic freedoms against legislatures

Evidence

Beginning in the early 1960s, Hayek began to suggest using the drafting of constitutions as a way to anchor economic freedoms against the attempts of legislatures to enact protectionist or redistributive policies. He had begun this effort in The Constitution of Liberty, which he wrote while he was at the University of Chicago, but this book was still extremely pessimistic about the possibilities of supranational organ­ization: “The moral foundations for a rule of law on an international scale seem to be completely lacking still, and we should prob­ably lose what­ever advantages it brings within the nation if ­today we ­were to entrust any of the new powers of government to supra-­national agencies.” — Quinn Slobodian, Globalists, 671

Categorization

• DEFINE: Explains the constitutionalist strategy of locking economic freedoms in against parliamentary redistribution.
• XREF: connects to: Hayek treated the US Constitution as a model for binding democratic majorities — Jessica Whyte, The Morals of the Market: Human Rights…, 361; Hayek distinguished authoritarian from totalitarian regimes to exempt Chile from criticism — Philip Mirowski & Dieter Plehwe (eds.), The Road from Mont Pèlerin: The Making…, 1590; Chile’s constitution fused Hayekian economics with patriarchal authoritarian concepts — Philip Mirowski & Dieter Plehwe (eds.), The Road from Mont Pèlerin: The Making…, 1593 (+1 more)

Broader Connections

• Hayek treated the US Constitution as a model for binding democratic majorities #expands (0.85) — Jessica Whyte, The Morals of the Market, 361