THESIS: THE INTERPLAY BETWEEN STRATEGIC AND CONSTITUTIONAL INNOVATION CHANGES THE CONSTITUTIONAL ORDER OF THE STATE.
Epochal wars produce fundamental challenges to the State. A warring state that is unable to prevail within the then-dominant strategic and constitutional practices will innovate. In such wars, successful innovations—either strategic or constitutional—by a single state are copied by other, competing states. This state mimicry sweeps through the society of states and results in the sudden shift in constitutional orders and strategic paradigms in the aftermath of an epochal war. By this means, a new dominant constitutional order emerges with new bases of legitimacy, and older forms decay and disappear.