Constitution, Public Finance, and Transition

This book explores the role of constitutions in public finance, with a special focus on transitional context in Central and Eastern Europe. The main questions addressed are: How do formal constitutional provisions that matter for public finance come about? How do constitutions shape policy choices in public finance? Part l of the book puts forth an analytical framework for analysing how fiscal constitutional provisions come about and tests the conjectures with the case of constitution-making in Estonia in 1991-1992. Part II summarises, synthesises and criticises the emerging orthodoxy in positive constitutional public finance and examines whether it can explain the commitment to fiscal discipline in Estonia between 1992 and 2007. Part III examines theoretically and empirically how constitutions can shape public finance laws via constitutional review, auto-limitation and constitutional deliberations.

The Author: Ringa Raudla is a research fellow in the Department of Public Administration at Tallinn University of Technology (Estonia). She holds a doctoral degree in economics from the Faculty of Law, Economics, and Social Sciences, University of Erfurt (Germany). Her main research interests are political economy, public finance and post-communist transition.

Constitutional political economy – Constitutional public finance – Institutional economics – Staatswissenschaften – Constitution-making in Central and Eastern Europe – Fiscal governance – Budgetary institutions – Constitutional politics – Constitutional review – Post-communist transition – Institutional development – Estonia – Fiscal policy. Inhaltsverzeichnis