In addition to the rule of law, a principle according to which government has to respect the laws passed by parliament, the sovereignty of parliament doctrine forms the second pivot around which all debate on the constitution takes place. This doctrine is based on the classic wording by the English constitutional theorist, Albert Venn Dicey (The Law of the Constitution 1885), according to which parliament has the right to pass or abolish any law it feels fit and that no body or person outside of parliament can change or ignore laws passed in the proper manner. Indeed, that achieved during the Glorious Revolution of 1688 is now putting the brakes on the democratization of the British political system, and, according to its critics, parliamentary sovereignty under Margaret Thatcher was partly responsible for paving the way back to an authoritarian or autocratic state. Criticism such as this is by no means directed at Britain's parliamentary democracy in general. It is merely referring to the simple fact that in Great Britain the step from parliamentary to people's sovereignty remains to be taken. The French Revolution's "republican dream" of sovereignty of the people, the essence of which is that all power is derived from the people took root across the continent and was incorporated into the constitutions of many nations. In contrast to the stance taken by the British during this period, today's constitutional reformers do not regard this scenario as a nightmare. Their aim is to free British citizens from their status as the Queen's subjects, at least in so far as their right to enforce individual rights is concerned. Reformers would like to see British citizens given legal authority to protect them against chance parliamentary majorities.

This problem of Parliament and therefore de facto the lower house being the only source of legality and legitimacy for political action has only been sharpened by the change during the 20th century, which has seen political party reason become the determining structural characteristic. Parliament is being forced into an irresolvable dilemma. On the one hand, the lack of a written constitution means that parliament is the only safe refuge for the public weal, the exclusive protector of British democracy and individual freedom. While on the other, the majority party in parliament passes legislation and agrees to policy initiatives selected by the government for which there is no right of appeal, neither for individual citizens nor for political institutions outside of parliament. When some British constitutional theorists insist that the Queen would have to sign her own death warrant should it be the wish of a sovereign Parliament they do not mean it purely in jest.

[Taken and translated from: Roland Sturm: Das britische Gemeinwesen heute; in: Der Bürger im Staat 41, 4/1991]

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