Barut Arkadiusz, The unity of people as a condition of rights protection – the (lost) chance of populism and liberal democracy. Polish example

The matter of the article is the relationship between the idea of unity of the subject of democratic power and the idea of subjective rights. The idea of the unity of the nation (people) is currently identified with populism. The aim of the article is to show that the unity of the subject of democratic power can be considered as a factor conducive to the protection of subjective rights against political interference, as long as the idea of this unity is properly understood – as constituted by the dialectic between the ideal and the empirical aspect of the people (of ‘two bodies’), justifying at the same time the demarcation of the boundaries of the public and private spheres. The secondary purpose of the article is to show that populism is not inconsistent with the idea of constitutionalism and the rule of law understood as the tempering of power enabling the protection of subjective rights . The conclusions of the analysis...