A major strand in american conservatism is to believe, strongly, in laws being made as close to the people they apply to as possible. This is why there is such an undercurrent from that side of reducing the scope of the federal gov while allowing private entities to have their own rules on their areas.

The level to which German society proscribes behavior top down with the law simply wouldn’t be tolerated across the spectrum for the simple reason no one would agree what the rules should be, even if they share the European idea that everyone else should follow the rules they personally support.

So what's stopping people from creating their own indivicual law, everyone for him/herself? That would be the closest you can get to the people ;-)