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In this article, I examine how open borders can serve the idea of global distributive justice by asking how or how not the existing practices of immigration to rich countries may contribute to global economic redistribution. There are two observations. First, migration is not the redistributive option that anyone has an equal access. In order to make use of migration as a means of global redistribution, rich countries need to provide a chance to migrate to those who cannot afford movement by themselves. Second, as long as brain-drain problems happen, what the perspective of global distributive justice requires is the compensation for some educational cost of raising professionals or some control of their movement. Immigration admissions largely focusing on getting highly skilled professionals may not serve the idea of global redistribution.
The debates about the interrelations between reason and law have undergone a change after the eighteenth century. References to the recta ratio of jusnaturalistic tradition have not disappeared, but other comprehensions of legal reason have developed. The European debate over legal positivist science has contributed to this in a manifestation of the rationality of law. This transformation may be considered the basis for the development of true “legal technologies” throughout the twentieth century. On the other hand, in the context of theories of positive law which have taken the relation between ethics and legal reason as a problem, the formation of discourses on coercion (Austin and Holmes), on validity (Kelsen and Hart) and on justification (Alexy and Dworkin) has also contributed to the emergence of new models of legal rationality. In this paper, it is highlighted that the construction of these models is linked to the “points of view” which theories have proposed as legitimate for the interpretation of legal phenomenon. And it is suggested that the discussion over points of view (defined as “focuses”, term which is close to the notion of “attitude”, “stance” or “place of speech”) may aid in the debate on the normativity of law.
The rule of law is unique establishment that had taken place in historical context, as politico-legal edifice of capitalist society. To the extent that any legal system was established in historical context, its form and functioning are cannot be channelled by reflections or professional commitments of lawyers and legal philosophers. The rule of law emerged in certain conditions that we say “classical liberalism”, of power allocation where we diversify political power and legal power in the milieu of political society, enunciated as republic or commonwealth. Contrary to earlier forms of legal order, capitalism was unique that its super structure was articulated according to the pivotal role of legal machinery. There was an actual equilibrium between legal and political domains that they moderately matched with public and private dichotomy. After monopoly capitalism, social setting of liberalism was dramatically incurred some major modifications which were firstly dislocation of liberal individual, incited by monopoly capital and secondly, political achievement of the working classes obtained political equality, as drastic consequence of mass society. Hence, the rule of law altered as depoliticsation of democratised mass society, instead of modus vivendi of liberal individuals, which demarcated the rule of law according to welfare society or sozialrechtsstaat. The neo-liberal globalisation after 1980’s, republican model of political society faded away that it has been transformed by transnational capital where markets, hierarchies, regionalism and communal settings crosscut inner equilibrium between politics and law. Finally, the newborn articulation of power structure undermined necessary basement of the rule of law.
Abstract/Keywords: Theory of communicative action, ontology of the sentence, systems, subsystems, role, function, crime of breach of duty, compensation, general and special prevention, rule of law, breach of communicative rationality, institutional rivalry and competition for organization, lord of the fact, the duty of guarantor, facticity and validity, counterfactual assertion, public use of reason, prosecution, transcendental ego, self, idealism, voyage, cognitive subject, object of knowledge, hermeneutics of criminal conduct and public servant
The process of finding evidence of what truthfully happened in a conflictive situation interests jurists and journalists but in different ways. When the work of journalists and judges are concerned the paradox is at stake. Both categories must tell a story about a conflict must listen to all involved, must inform what happened to the general public. Although both categories must use the freedom must use the freedom of speech their point of view about something with objectivity, their timing is different as well as the process and the effect of fulfilling their task. That question that should be made is what happen to law when it becomes the subject matter to the news in the world of full information? In what measurement journalists also pass judgements and how this affects the formal processes of law? The effort to answer these questions and the ones related to them is important to understand some of the problems that must be approached in order to establish the ways of law and of the mass media technological society.
The bare life and (the) modern law : a journey to some key concepts or conceptions of Agamben
(2012)
This text is imitating a journey which tries to explore what is completely unknown. It starts Homo Sacer and traces some key concepts namely der Muselmann, bare life, state of exception, sovereignty and nihilism in law. Doing so, it hopes to reach a general picture of biopolitics or biopower according to Agamben. So, first part of this text generally tries to clarify some fundamental concepts or conceptions in order to use them for its aim. The second part suggests an alternative reading of Agamben, centered around his concept of der Muselmann which is the ultimate figure defined by Primo Levi and Agamben chooses the term because of its resemblance to or representation of Homo Sacer. Der Muselmann was a derogatory term in its origin and very meaning has still been unclear today. So, the second part tries to clarify the meaning of der Muselmann (and unbaptized babies) from a different outlook, not from outside but inside of the referred concept. It tries to show a Muslim’s image of a non Muslim world in order to reveal what are the very meanings of sovereignty, law and biopolitics. So at the end of the journey, this text hopes to reach a different picture of modern life and a modern law.
Jurisprudence under the perspective of the new media and its effect on the communication of law
(2012)
Despite the law knowledge presumption, Jurisprudence has not always considered the effects introduced by the communication of law in the transition from the print to the electric revolution, using here concepts and ideas of McLuhan´s theory.
The use of Internet by Brazilian Courts (on line transmission of trials, the digital process, transformation of courts in source of news on what concerns their decisions) is an interesting example of how the new medium interferes in the substance of the message of law, since the movement of the messages must be considered to understand the epistemological domain of law. New elements are introduced by the new media and interact with the old meanings, concepts and processes of law and of the old media and can themselves bring new conflicts that are relevant to the comprehension of the complete and real dynamics of Law.
A Privacy Impact Assessment (PIA) is a systematic risk assessment tool, enabling organizations to maintain compliance with data protection regulations, to manage privacy risks and to provide public benefits through the success of privacy-by-design efforts. An actual practical implementation of a PIA framework has been realized in the context of RFID applications encompassing detailed steps for the PIA process; a first successful review has been completed. The PIA also allows to introduce a pro-active mitigation of privacy risks through technical and organizational controls. The better the precautionary measures realize the relevant privacy objectives, the less likely will occur with the PIA process afterwards. The recent proposal for a far-reaching revision of the EU Data Protection Directive envisages to state a specific requirement to implement a PIA process. Indeed, since risks for privacy and non-disclosure of personal data are different in not identical circumstances, the protection measures should also be different, i.e. technology should assist in trying to achieve the (at least) second-best solution for the implementation of the data protection regime by a PIA. Insofar, privacy rules can be individualized and matched with the concrete needs in the given environment.
This paper seeks to analyse the debate on equality between women and men found in the claims against the subjects related to Education for Citizenship. These claims were resolved in the Spanish Supreme Court and High Courts of the Autonomous Communities. In this debate, there is a strong rejection of antidiscrimination law assumptions, namely that the different roles and social roles of women and men have a cultural and social base and it is unnatural, as evidenced by the concept of gender. But many appellants and judgments defend the difference between women and men as if it was informed and legitimated on human nature. Hence gender is considered an ideology, that is, a category of analysis by means of which the reality of true human nature can be concealed or distorted. But these arguments are opposed to recent legal reforms since they are questioning its normative value, by prioritizing certain moral principles against these laws. We are talking about the Organic Law for Effective Equality between Women and Men, the Law on Integrated Protection Measures against Gender Violence and the Law on Education. However their arguments are not fully justified.
What is it that makes the subject of bioethics autonomous? The problem that this research tries to clarify is What is it that makes the subject of bioethics autonomous? This question is answered from an applied ethics, bioethics. This article will show a new methodological approach to study the subject of bioethics.
The principal objetives of this research that is presented here, are related to the relationship between: 1) Autonomy and information; 2) Autonomy and responsability; 3) Autonomy and freedom; and 4) Autonomy and social ties or social links.
Some advances in legal practical reason: for a progressive dialogue with contemporary hermeneutics
(2012)
This paper intends to critically discuss some points of the contemporary thesis concerning constitutional hermeneutics and methodology of law. Once identified some authors and the lines of argumentation affiliated grosso modo to the linguistic turn and rhetoric, as well as the core of the transcendental powers of communication (v.g. N. MacCormick, R. Alexy, K. Günther), the objective is to identify some dialogue with economics and political science, enlightened by recent researches about Hegel-Marx interpretations of social life. Of course the discussion inevitably passes through methodological questions, opposing analytics vs. dialectics, idealistic vs. realists standpoints. In a effort to foment the inclusive dialogue between points of view concerning the concept of law that may create (not necessarily) radical opponents, the lines of conclusion intents to revisit some foundations of Hegelian "method" (so to speak) and intends to give a modest contribution to a more profound analysis of the relations between sein and sollen categories, in order to enrich the discussions about technology and social life, specially the life of the law nowadays.
"Community and law approach" provides an illuminating insight into alternative legal orderings within a social unit. The comprehensiveness of legal systems within a community or a social unit, provides a suitable basis for a structural framework of alternative legal systems or Legal Pluralism, which is missing in the discourse on Legal Pluralism. "Identifying the locus of law within a community", provides us with an indication on how autopoetic a legal system can be within a social unit, taking into account the social rootedness of legal norms.
The problem of this paper is prompted by the claim of Zagreb University students residing in government subsidized dormitories that their duty to act for free as dorm night porters amounts to forced labour. After a preliminary note on the nature and types of legal scholarship, the paper restates jurisprudential arguments against student rights and analyses limitations inherent in legal scholarship in action, or jurisprudence, that make it unresponsive to student rights: a limited normative framework and a limited subject-matter, most notably a limited focus of inquiry when it comes to force or coercion. A glimpse at an analysis of force in international law indicates that the naked force typical of elementary criminal law has dissolved long ago into phenomena remotely related to naked force, such as economic pressure and ideological propaganda. Two legal and social contexts of force are of primary interest to understanding student rights. The first is legal recognition of the vulnerability of children to naked force. The second is the blind eye of jurisprudence for the vulnerability of workers to economic need. The belief in economic necessity and subjugation of the state to capital has resulted in a bizarre reversal of the roles of corporations and students. Jurisprudence cannot change the world but can interpret it more sensibly. What is required is a re-examination of maturity and emancipation within the emerging world law.
The doubt about certainty like an absolute value in law and as an ideal full in legal system (argument about impossibility) is a controversial fact in contemporary legal theory. In this text I examine some contemporary doctrines about the classic understanding (in critical sense) of this ideal. I have selected the most representative doctrines: doctrine about "open texture of Law" (H.L.A. Hart), starting point in this discussion; doctrine about "Il Diritto mite" (G. Zagrebelsky), from the continental European legal tradition at present; and doctrine about "vagueness in Law" (T.A.O. Endicott), this doctrine is the most recent, from the Anglo-Saxon legal tradition. Finally, in Conclusions, I analyze if this doubt (argument about impossibility) contaminates (in some sense) to the concept of law or to the characteristics that describe law in the contemporary Constitutional State.
The aim of this paper is to explore the case of the Spanish ‘indignants’ movement of May 2011 as an example of the structural changes occurring in the public sphere after the emergence of a new type of social movement characterized by the widespread use of the ICTs. First I focus on the ideological dimension of discourse of the ‘indignants’ movement, so as to reconstruct the protesters’ self-image. They thought that ICTs were playing a prominent role in a wider trend towards a regeneration of democracy, but they were rather misguided because they lack an accurate description of what really happened. In the second part of this paper I will challenge some features of my case study, emphasizing three basic elements of a democratic public sphere. I aim to call into question the idea that a ‘truly’ democratic public may be hosted by the emergent communicative environment.
Based on Walter Benjamin’s reflections on history and social struggles, this paper drafts an analysis of the relations of the subject with some problems of constitutional theory, in a first effort to bring the field nearer to social philosophy. After tracing a short narrative on modern constitutionalism and its new relationship with the historical time, we argument that Constitution shall be seen as a cultural document of memory of the social struggles of the past and at the same an object of the struggles of the present. Some inconclusive reflections on the possibility of human emancipation through law are presented as conclusion.
"Selbstverwaltung" war das Thema der Hofgeismarer Tagung der Vereinigung für Verfassungsgeschichte 2008. So interessant die einzelnen Referate auch waren, ihre unterschiedlichen Zugriffe und inhaltlichen Ausrichtungen gebieten es doch, nicht die einzelnen Aufsätze des Tagungsbandes zu referieren, sondern den Versuch zu unternehmen, aus der Vielfalt der Beiträge strukturierende Überlegungen herauszuarbeiten. Daher sei nur kurz auf die Themen der einzelnen Referate verwiesen. Gerhard Dilcher sprach über die mittelalterliche Stadt, Ludwig Elle über die Selbstverwaltung(sbestrebungen) der Sorben; Matthias Asche trug zur Autonomie der Hugenotten und Waldenser vor und J. Friedrich Battenberg zu der der jüdischen Gemeinden und Landjudenschaften im Heiligen Römischen Reich. Christoph Schönberger befasste sich mit französischen Parlamenten (vor der Revolution), Jörg-Detlef Kühne mit den Selbstverwaltungsvorstellung von Steins. Hans-Christof Kraus referierte zur englischen Selbstverwaltung und deren deutscher Rezeption, Thomas Simon behandelte die Föderalisierung Österreichs. Und schließlich trug Dieter Kugelmann zum Stellenwert des Selbstverwaltungsgedankens in der europäischen Kooperation und Integration vor. – Die folgenden Ausführungen beschränken sich darauf, diejenigen Aussagen herauszustellen, die sich in grundsätzlicher Weise zu Selbstverwaltungsverständnissen (1), zu den Realisierungsformen von Selbstverwaltung (2), zu den Ursachen von Selbstverwaltung (3) und zu Konzeptualisierungen von Selbstverwaltung (4) äußern. ...
Spätestens seit den 1980er Jahren ist Partizipation ein mächtiges Schlagwort. In neuerer Zeit kann man damit sogar Wahlen gewinnen. Wo herkömmliche Legitimationsmodi der repräsentativen Demokratie an Kraft verlieren oder zu verlieren scheinen, sucht man nach Ersatz. Das Prinzip der Legitimation durch allgemeine Wahl der Vertretungskörperschaften funktioniert da nicht, wo es solche Vertretungskörperschaften nicht gibt – bzw. diese, wie in der EU, auf weiten Gebieten nicht über die Entscheidungsprärogative verfügen – oder sie als verkrustet angesehen werden und/oder dort, wo die Mobilisierung des Bürgers zwischen den Wahlterminen nötig erscheint. Bürgerschaftliche Partizipation hat einen ambivalenten Charakter. Sie kann Belebung oder Gefährdung von Demokratie sein, wobei dies auch vom jeweils zugrundegelegten Demokratieverständnis abhängt. ...
Mit Schillers Wort von Sprache, die selbst dichtet und denkt, rekurrierte Ernst Forsthoff zeitweise auf einen unverfügbaren Eigenwert der Rechtssprache jenseits positivistischer Legalitätsmanöver, auswechselbarer Naturrechtsideologien, aber auch eines mehr oder weniger beliebigen, bestimmte Gegebenheiten akzentuierenden oder idealisierenden konkreten Ordnungsdenkens. Gegenüber solcher Funktionalisierung und – nahe Heidegger’schem Jargon – "technischer Zurichtung" bei ständiger "Veränderung der Wertskala der Zwecke" wollte Forsthoff die Wissenschaft der "Belehrung durch die Sprache selbst überlassen". Er plädierte für eine "Wiederherstellung der juristischen Hermeneutik als Disziplin von eigener logischer Struktur", stark angelehnt an Savigny und, wie Florian Meinel betont, "seiner Zeit um zwanzig Jahre voraus" (262). Angesichts der Missbrauchsanfälligkeit der selbst ideologischen Vorstellung einer wahren Sprache kann man mit dem Brieffreund Fritz von Hippel eine weitere Steigerung der Sprachverwirrung monieren und Forsthoffs Appell an die hermeneutische Tugend mit Meinel als "juristische Durchhalteparole im Weltbürgerkrieg der Ideologien" auffassen (263f.). Tiefschichtiger interpretiert Meinel sodann aber die von Forsthoff gesuchte Anlehnung an die Sprachphilosophie von Hamann und Herder im Sinne einer theologischen Rechtsbegründung, die die göttlich gestiftete und nicht menschlich gemachte Sprache wie Ordnung dem instrumentalistischen Zugriff des Exegeten entrücken soll (264). Übrigens hat Forsthoff dieses rechtstheologische Moment in seiner unveröffentlichten rechtsphilosophischen und ebenfalls an Savigny orientierten Studie "Die Institutionen als Rechtsbegriff" (1944/47) fortgeschrieben, bezugnehmend jetzt vornehmlich auf vorgeordnete organische Ordnungszusammenhänge, wie sie auch schon in "Recht und Sprache" aufgeschienen waren. Jede Institution sollte neben einem sachlichen ein personelles Element in Form eines bestimmten Menschenbildes aufweisen, das der evangelische Pfarrerssohn nach der Lehre Martin Luthers durch Fehlsamkeit und Erlösungsbedürftigkeit bestimmte und von da aus die Einordnung individueller Willensautonomie in Strukturen objektiver, überindividueller, gleichwohl geschichtlich wandelbarer Bindungen anthropologisch rechtfertigte (291). Den alles ins Provisorische und Diskutable schiebenden "modernen Massendemokratien", einschließlich der auf "Herrenkult" aufbauenden "massendemokratischen Diktaturstaaten", schrieb Forsthoff eine geradezu antiinstitutionelle Verschleißkraft zu (292f.). Dass auch dieser Versuch, dem juristischen Denken einen neutralen, ideologiefreien Raum zu vindizieren, nicht gelingen konnte, weil sich hinter dem institutionellen Rechtsdenken ebenfalls ein eigenes geschichtliches Legitimitätskonzept versteckte (298), leuchtet theoretisch ein und unterstreicht den Standort im Zeitalter der Ideologien. ...
Mit der Europäischen Rechtsgeschichte verfügt die Rechtsgeschichte seit vielen Jahrzehnten über eine Tradition transnationaler rechtshistorischer Forschung. Sie wurde von deutschsprachigen Wissenschaftlern der Vor- und Nachkriegszeit geprägt – Emil Seckel, Paul Koschaker, Franz Wieacker, Helmut Coing – und stand im Kontext des westeuropäischen Nachkriegsprojekts. Noch heute bauen wir auf ihren großen Leistungen auf. Sie war, wie alle Geschichtswissenschaft, Teil eines Prozesses der gesellschaftlichen Selbstverständigung über die eigene Identität und zeichnete das Bild einer distinkten europäischen Rechtskultur.
In den letzten Jahren sind im Zuge der Diskussion um postkoloniale Perspektiven auf die Geschichte, um Transnationale und Globalgeschichte, viele Grundlagen der traditionellen Europahistoriographie kritisiert und massiv erschüttert worden. Das wirft Fragen auch an die Europäische Rechtsgeschichte auf: Welches Europabild liegt ihr zu Grunde? Auf welchen intellektuellen und konzeptionellen Grundlagen beruht sie? Wie antwortet sie auf die Vorwürfe des Eurozentrismus, des epistemischen Kolonialismus, wie auf die Forderung, Europa zu ‘provinzialisieren’? Wie definiert sie das Verhältnis der Europäischen zur Transnationalen und Globalen Rechtsgeschichte? - Diesen und ähnlichen Fragen wenden sich die folgenden Überlegungen zu. Der Schwerpunkt liegt auf einer Auseinandersetzung mit der Tradition, ihren konzeptionellen Grundlagen und deren wissenschaftshistorischem Kontext (1. Teil, 1.-6.). Aus dieser kritischen Bestandsaufnahme und den Ergebnissen der Debatte um Globalgeschichte ergeben sich Ausgangspunkte und Aufgaben einer in vielem auf den Leistungen der Disziplin aufbauenden, doch notwendigerweise auf einer anderen Konzeption beruhenden Rechtsgeschichte Europas in globalhistorischer Perspektive (2. Teil, 7.-11.).
Die rechtsförmige Bewältigung von Leid, Ungerechtigkeit und Unrecht, die durch die kommunistischen Regime der DDR, Osteuropas und der UdSSR verursacht wurden, ist Gegenstand zahlreicher rechts- und geschichtswissenschaftlicher Studien. Untersucht werden die Aufarbeitung des Unrechts durch Strafrecht und die Regelung von Restitution sowie Entschädigung im Fall von Enteignungen. Oft wird – auch infolge der Spezialisierung der jeweiligen Wissenschaftler – das Genre des Länderberichts gewählt. Untersuchungen, die in vergleichender Absicht auch die Aufarbeitung nationalsozialistischen Unrechts einbeziehen, gehen von einer Vergleichbarkeit aus, ohne dass darüber ein neuer Historikerstreit entbrannt wäre. ...
This article tries to outline possible research topics in the field of comparative 20th century legal history between Europe and Latin-America. It seeks to examine changes both in Labour and Property law as core areas where social conceptions began to influence »liberal« private law. Focussing on an example from Mexican law in the aftermath of the revolution which took place in the first decades of the 20th century, it is argued that new conceptions in both fields were discussed using similar conceptual patterns in Europe and LatinAmerica. In the reaction of the jurists from both continents to the challenges of the new century lies a possibility for fruitful comparison. Conducting research in such a framework can also produce comparative results on the interplay between constitutional law and private law – especially when the focus lies on Germany and Mexico, where new constitutions at the beginning of the new century did evoke reactions in the discourses about private law. With regard to methodology it has to be observed that such research has to go far beyond the traditional pattern of »reception« of legal concepts from Europe in Latin-America, and to highlight more complex ways of transition of legal forms between the two continents.
Seit dem 17. Jahrhundert gibt es historische Reflexionen darüber, wie und warum das antike römische Recht, geformt durch Lehre und Praxis des mittelalterlichen Italiens nördlich der Alpen, "rezipiert" worden sei. Ebenso diskutierte man seit dem 19. Jahrhundert über das Lübecker Stadtrecht im Rahmen der Hanse sowie die Ausbreitung des Magdeburger Rechts auf Städte im slawischen Osten. Die heutige Rechtsgeschichte sucht nach neuen Modellen und Terminologien, um den Transfer von Gesetzbüchern, Rechtsprinzipien, Institutionen, Rechtssprache oder kulturellem Habitus von Rechtsanwendern angemessener zu erfassen. Berichtet wird hier über ein Südosteuropaprojekt (1850 bis 1933) mit Blick auf den Transfer normativer Ordnungen (Verfassungsrecht, Zivilrecht, Strafrecht) in ehemaligen Provinzen des Osmanischen Reichs, die nun zu jungen Nationalstaaten wurden, etwa Griechenland, Rumänien, Bulgarien, Serbien, Montenegro und Albanien.
Die Wissenschaftsgeschichte des öffentlichen Rechts, ein noch schwaches Pflänzchen im Garten der Rechtsgeschichte, kann erfreuliche Zuwächse verzeichnen, und zwar aus der Schweiz. Zum einen sind in Band 130 (2011) der Zeitschrift für Schweizerisches Recht zwei große, fast Buchformat erreichende Aufsätze erschienen, von Anne-Christine Favre, Cent ans de droit administratif: de la gestion des biens de police à celle des risques environnementeaux, 227–330 sowie von Benjamin Schindler, 100 Jahre Verwaltungsrecht in der Schweiz, S. 331–437. Zum anderen gibt es das hier zu würdigende Werk von Andreas Kley, der in Zürich Öffentliches Recht, Verfassungsgeschichte sowie Staats- und Rechtsphilosophie lehrt. Nimmt man diese drei Arbeiten zusammen und fügt noch die Verfassungsgeschichte der Schweiz des unvergessenen Alfred Kölz (1944–2003) hinzu, dann kann geradezu von einem Quantensprung gesprochen werden. ...
Raymond Saleilles (1855–1912) gilt als einer der größten Juristen seiner Epoche und Wegbereiter der französischen Rechtswissenschaft in ein neues Jahrhundert. Auch außerhalb Frankreichs hat sein vielschichtiges Werk in letzter Zeit historische Aufmerksamkeit erfahren, unter anderem mit Schwerpunkt auf der Rechtsvergleichung (Alfons Aragoneses) oder Saleilles’ Beurteilung der deutschen Rechtswissenschaft (Birte Gast). Der Florentiner Rechtshistoriker Marco Sabbioneti hat nun eine umfassende Monographie über Privatrechtsdogmatik und politisch-religiöse Grundeinstellungen des französischen Juristen vorgelegt, dessen Werk oft schlagwortartig mit – aus deutscher Sicht – kulturhistorischen Epocheneinteilungen wie "Belle Epoque" oder "Modernismo" in Verbindung gebracht wird. ...
No se puede reducir sólo a un fenómeno religioso el hecho histórico de la existencia del Cristianismo. Ya como judíos marginales en el siglo I o como habitantes del Imperio Romano, con una obediencia debida pero limitada a las autoridades seculares, los cristianos fueron constituyéndose en un grupo difícil de integrar bajo una perspectiva únicamente religiosa. Entre los miembros de la Iglesia Católica, además de una multitud humilde y pobre, no faltarán nobles, filósofos, juristas, científicos, reyes, emperadores, cuyas actividades marcarán a propios y ajenos por el carácter dogmático de una creencia religiosa cuyas aristas van mucho más allá de la práctica privada. Los acontecimientos históricos, que aquí sobraría desarrollar, llevaron al desarrollo y constitución de la Santa Sede, «institución», o más tarde, «persona jurídica pública», por nombrar sólo algunas formas de caracterizarla. La autoridad religiosa y moral, incluso civil, del Romano Pontífice, y por lo tanto, extensiva jurídicamente a la Santa Sede, influyó decididamente, en forma positiva o negativa, en la cultura occidental aun cuando en sus efectos no se hubiese deseado de esa manera. Como Obispo de Roma, sucesor del Apóstol Pedro, es cabeza de la Iglesia Católica, y gobernará la conciencia y actuar de millares durante ya casi dos milenios. ...
Das Gesetz zur Änderung des Vormundschafts- und Betreuungsrechts ist am 14. April 2011 vom Deutschen Bundestag beschlossen worden; der Bundesrat hat am 25.05.2011 zugestimmt. Dieses Gesetz trat – mit einigen Ausnahmen, die erst ein Jahr nach der Verkündung des Gesetzes in Kraft treten – am 6.7.2011 in Kraft. Der Schwerpunkt dieses Beitrags soll nicht bei den durch diese Reform bereits erfolgten bzw. demnächst in Kraft tretenden Änderungen und den sich bereits abzeichnenden Schwierigkeiten seiner Umsetzung liegen, vielmehr soll es um die Ziele und Grundsätze einer noch weitergehenden Reform (zweite Stufe) gehen, die die Rechtspolitik im Rahmen der Verabschiedung dieses Gesetzes für erforderlich gehalten und bereits in Aussicht gestellt hat (zweite Stufe). Dennoch sollen zunächst die Essentials dieses ersten wichtigen und richtigen Reformschritts nochmals in Stichworten am Anfang dieses Beitrags stehen. Dieses Gesetz wurde auch schon als "Amtsvormundschaftsverbesserungsgesetz" und als Minimalkompromiss apostrophiert, was angesichts der Fokussierung dieses ersten Reformschrittes nicht überrascht.
The use of most if not all technologies is accompanied by negative side effects, While we may profit from today’s technologies, it is most often future generations who bear most risks. Risk analysis therefore becomes a delicate issue, because future risks often cannot be assigned a meaningful occurance probability. This paper argues that technology assessement most often deal with uncertainty and ignorance rather than risk when we include future generations into our ethical, political or juridal thinking. This has serious implications as probabilistic decision approaches are not applicable anymore. I contend that a virtue ethical approach in which dianoetic virtues play a central role may supplement a welfare based ethics in order to overcome the difficulties in dealing with uncertainty and ignorance in technology assessement.
Technocracy is usually opposed to democracy. Here, another perspective is taken: technocracy is countered with the rule of law. In trying to understand the contemporary dynamics of the rule of law, two main types of legal systems (in a broad sense) have to be distinguished: firstly, the legal norm, studied by the science of law; secondly, the scientific laws (which includes the legalities of the different sciences and communities). They both contain normative prescriptions. But their differ in their subjects‘ source: while legal norms are the will’s expression of the normative authority, technical prescriptions can be derived from scientific laws, which are grounded over the commonly supposed objectivity of the scientific knowledge about reality. They both impose sanctions too, but in the legal norm they refer to what is established by the norm itself, while in the scientific legality they consist in the reward or the punishment derived from the efficacy or inefficacy to reach the end pursued by the action. The way of legitimation also differs: while legal norms have to have followed the formal procedures and must not have contravened any fundamental right, technical norms‘ validity depend on its theoretical foundations or on its efficacy. Nowadays, scientific knowledge has become and important feature in policy-making. Contradictions can arise between these legal systems. These conflicts are specially grave when the recognition or exercise of fundamental rights is instrumentally used, or when they are violated in order to increase the policies‘ efficacy. A political system is technocratic, when, in case of contradiction, the scientific law finally prevails.
In information society, legal norm communications have been never established in certain fields for a long time. That is, a few legal norms have never obeyed in the fields. Above all, legal norms which relate to data protection, information contents and information security, would often infringed. Most violation would be conducted by using information technologies. Information technologies would often be used in these infringing incidents. It can be said that these infringing incidents would have never been conducted without information technology. These infringing incidents include hacking actions, personal data abuse, personal information disclosure, unauthorized access, infringing copyrights, infringing privacy rights, and so on. A way of preventing those infringements is to raise the level of punishment against the violators. But, it will prove to be disappointing. Furthermore, it would be an ex post facto measure to the last. It would be needed to invent an ex ante measure, if it is possible. As the ex ante measure, the author proposes a fusion of law and information technology. An information technology will lead people to a lawful deed when they conduct actions in using computers and networks. They say that information technology cures information technology. After all, the fusion will aim at realizing laws, and it will contribute to recover a social justice.
Since de advent of what is known as new constitucionalism, jurists have faced a difficult task in order to overcome some failures of normative positivism. In this context, the judiciary has played a renewed role, which can be justified on grounds of legal theory and on institutional reasons. However, this new role has led legal philosophers to several concerns, such as the relationship between law and ethics. On one hand, Critical Legal Studies points out that the judge always acts informed by his own convictions. On the other hand, according to R. Forst (within another context, but also relevant here), this is not really a problem, because a rule can be provided with ethics, but not ethically justified. This openness of law to moral makes it difficult for the interpretative judicial discourse to be taken as claimed by K. Günther: as a discourse of application only, and not of justification. All these controversies, however, lead to a common statement: the constitutional adjudication has been exercising a different activity. Some legal systems allows such activity legitimacy in some extent, like Brazilian’s, for example, which i) states a very broad adjudication, ii) provides an extensive catalog of basic rights, and iii) contains several procedural mechanisms for their protection. This empowers the adjudication to exercise what can be called a political activity. Therefore, a series of moral issues which were once exclusive to the political arena have been brought to the judiciary, such as: gay marriage, abortion, affirmative action, religious freedom, federation, separation of powers, distribution of scarce resources. In a democracy, these moral questions ought to be mainly decided through deliberation outside the judiciary, but not always this is what happens. The paper discusses these issues, showing also how the Brazilian Supreme Court has dealt - technically, or not - with this relationship between law and justice in a complex and pluralist society.
Are Kantian philosophy and its principle of respect for persons inadequate to the protection of environmental values? This paper answers this question by elucidating how Kantian ethics can take environmental values seriously. In the period that starts with the Critique of Judgment in 1790 and ends with the Metaphysics of Morals in 1797, the subject would have been approached by Kant in a different manner; although the respect that we may owe to non-human nature is still grounded in our duties to mankind, the basis for such respect stems from nature’s aesthetic properties, and the duty to preserve nature lies in our duties to ourselves. Compared to the “market paradigm”, as it is called by Gillroy (the reference is to a conception of a public policy based on a criterion of economic efficiency or utility), Kantian philosophy can offer a better explanation of the relationship between environmental policy and the theory of justice. Kantian justice defines the “just state” as the one that protects the moral capacities of its “active” citizens, as presented in the first Part of the Metaphysics of Morals. In the Kantian paradigm, the environmental risk becomes a “public” concern. That means it is not subsumed under an individual decision, based on a calculus.
Agamben has claimed to work inside the tradition inaugurated by the archaeological method of Michel Foucault but not to fully coincide with it. “My method is archaeological and paradigmatic in a sense which is very close to that of Foucault, but not completely coincident with it. The question is, facing the dichotomies that structuralize our culture, to go beyond the exceptions that have been producing the former, however, not to find a chronologically originary state, but to be able to understand the situation in which we are. Archaeology is, in this sense, the only way to access present” (interview to Flavia Costa, trad. Susana Scramim, in Revista do Departamento de Psicologia – Universidade Federal Fluminense, Niterói, v. 18 - n. 1, 131-136, Jan./Jun. 2006, 132, translated by the author). However, the aspects in which Agamben follows Foucault's method and the ones he does not were never very clear. This situation seems to change with the edition of Agamben's most extensive and explicit texts on method, Signatura Rerum. Sul Metodo (2008, italian edition). The goal of this article is to identify the points of intersection between their methods and some points in which they differ.
This paper is aimed to re-elaborate questions and discuss them rather than presenting answers. It starts with the dialog concerning specific contributions of philosophy of language to Law, followed by the re-elaboration of some yet unanswered problems, as well as the discussion of possible paths for this issue.
In their book Principles of Biomedical Ethics, Tom Beauchamp and James Childress offer an account of bioethics, called “Principlism”, by way of specifying and balancing four clusters of principles.2 These principles are found, as the author state, in a common morality, understood as a set of universally shared moral beliefs.
This paper seeks to introduce the following questions: Does this account of Beauchamp and Childress flow from common morality in a natural way? Can their proposals claim to be endorsed by the authority of common morality? If not, in what way does Principlism contribute to bioethics?
Brazil has one of the worst distributions of income in the world. The wealth of the richest 1% of the population is equal to that of the poorest 50%. Brazil has a greater concentration of wealth than ninety-five percent of the countries on which data is available. In the legal field, tax justice is based on the constitutional principle of the “ability to pay”, according to which taxes should be paid based on the economic capacity of the taxpayer. This principle first appeared in the Brazilian legal order in the 1946 Constitution, was excluded from the texts of 1967/69, and reappeared in § 1 of article 145 of the 1988 Constitution. The aim of this paper is to examine two possible grounds for the ability to pay principle (equal sacrifices and proportional sacrifices) to show how, in Brazil, the interpretations that seek to assign a positive content to the principle are limited to the horizons of a particular form of State associated with the theory of equal sacrifice. This theory for its turn is consistent with a theory of justice, under which no expense or charge levied by the government can alter the distribution of welfare produced by the market. As the application of the ability to pay principle is done within the limits of that horizon, as a consequence, this principle does not play an important role in the issue of reduction of inequality in Brazil.
John Gray is the thinker who has reconstructed the main tenets of ethical pluralism inherent in the work of its initiator - Isaiah Berlin - and pointed to its consequences for political philosophy. In particular he singled out three levels of conflict in ethics identifiable in Berlin’s writings: among the ultimate values belonging to the same morality or code of conduct, among whole ways or styles of life and within goods or values which are themselves internally complex and inherently pluralistic.
It is the third, internal kind of conflict that proves to be the richest in implications.Because it undermines a whole constellation of contemporary liberal doctrines informed by the Kantian-Lockean tradition that conform to the legal paradigm. From the pluralist perspective such monumental theories (e.g. those of Rawls or Dworkin) are no longer sustainable due to the recognition that no ultimate value is immune to the phenomenon of incommensurability. Thus, irresolvable conflicts may also break out within the given regulative value.
Confronting ethical pluralism with general reflection on law has mostly negative consequences. Nevertheless, the incommensurability thesis sheds considerable light on certain legal disputes. This claim will be illustrated by interpreting from the pluralist perspective the controversy over the verdict by the European Tribunal of Human Rights of 3 November 2010 concerning hanging crosses in classrooms.
The increase in the volume of litigation verified since the 1990’s, having the Brazilian society as context, made the judiciary open itself to new technologies which facilitate the access to justice, as well as to a faster resolution of the demands. However, the intense insertion of technical rationalization in the process and decision operations by the judiciary, during the last years, led to a legalization supported by presuppositions of technical-instrumental regulation. According to the goal policy established by the CNJ, the annoyance of the instrumental rationality is present “with respect to purposes”, which demands, more and more, a mere fulfillment of previously instituted goals from the law operators. The matter is to know if the implementation of new technologies to solve the growing litigation coming from the complexity of societies is enough to adjust the Law to a post-conventional platform. If the social complexity implies resources coming from new technologies, it’s not certain that such technologies, on their own, satisfactorily answer a judicial model which, seen under the eyes of the post- conventional legitimacy and regulation, is adequate to complex societies. This illustrates that a judicial model, able to deal with the social plurality, must take into account not only the rules of instrumental rationality, but also the fundamental issues of communicative rationality. This current work intends to evaluate if the applicability of the instrumental rationality in the judiciary equally allows the law to extent the useful conditions of the communicative rationality to the consensual formation of will and opinion in the Democratic State of Law.
The Brazilian Constitution of 1988 declares Brazil as a Democratic State of Law. This formally democratic legal status has been facing difficulties when it comes to its material implementation. Brazilian legal procedures are still greatly influenced by the catholic heritage from Portugal in the times of colonization, translated in the present times into a strong moral set of dogmas that still reflects upon the legal production and interpretation in the country. Recently in Brazil, a debate brought to the Supremo Tribunal Federal, the Brazilian Federal Supreme Court, has evidenced the struggle between Ethics and Morality in the country’s legal scenario. The focus of the discussion was the possibility of abortion of anencephalic fetuses (in Brazil, abortion in considered a crime against life). In order to properly ground its decision, the Court invited scientists, doctors, members of feminist movements and representatives of certain religions to a public dialogue, in which both scientific-technical and purely moral-religious arguments were presented. Although these procedures encouraged and promoted a democratic and pluralistic legal debate, it seems like the crucial point of the discussion were not taken into account: the scientific character of Law. This is the object of the present manuscript: in order to ensure an intersubjective construction and application of Law, this must be perceived as an Applied Social Science and judges, lawyers, legislators and all other legal actors must proceed in a scientific way. To illustrate the theme, the specific case of abortion of anencephalic fetuses will be mentioned through the text.
A discussion regarding the complex relationship that exists between the concepts of efficiency and justice goes a long way back and raises several relevant arguments. One of them, and it must be rejected in advance, is that justice is in the realm of public law, while efficiency in that of private law. Is it unacceptable that the balance between public and private law leads to the belief of a divided legal system; one system, one set of laws, one legal system. Legislators and judges are responsible for determining a balance and no theory can postulate that the balance will always be found with a simple cut between public and private law to distinguish when the criterion should be justice or when it should be efficiency. It is reductionist to confine the discussion to single goals of efficiency and justice, when human dignity and human rights should also be considered when one is discussing law. Moreover, a discussion limited to only the concepts of justice and efficiency, relies on a belief that the terms are mutually exclusive. Posner has said that the economic analysis of law has limits and philosophy of law plays an extremely important role in this discourse, which must be interdisciplinary. There can be no goal other than the realization of human rights and there can be no justice if not shared by all of mankind.
The very idea of the European Convention on Human Rights is to bring the laws of contracting states into line with fundamental human rights principles. Where the Convention is not explicit, the Court should never rule restrictively so as to reduce the scope of a general right. In the case of homeschooling, the Convention sets forth the general principle that “the state shall respect the right of parents to ensure such education and teaching in conformity with their own religious and philosophical convictions.” It must not, therefore, allow a contracting state to eliminate a means of achieving this desired by parents—unless the state can show that the means in question is ineffective.
In his new book, R. Dworkin advocates the unity of values thesis. He wants to circumscribe morality as a proper epistemological domain which is methodologically different from scientific inquiry. The epistemological independence of morality is supposed to be a consequence of the irreducible fact/value dichotomy. This paper sustains that unity of values thesis is methodologically correct; all moral reasoning must be a constructive interpretation of its meaning. However, that author fails to recognize that not every axiological interpretation implies moral consequences. From H. Putnam’s pragmatic realism, this paper intends to demonstrate that much of scientific inquiry relies on values interpretation, and that this kind of reasoning is morally neutral. Finally, it should be clear that epistemological choices in legal positivism – e.g. the decision on which aspects of social interaction are theoretically relevant – should not disturb the soundness of its argument nor should it be read as if it had moral implications. This paper concludes that positivist theories cannot be ruled out. Since the choice between descriptive and interpretative models requires a circular justification, legal theory is itself an activity governed by epistemic values interpretation. Likewise natural sciences, it can only be understood from an internal perspective. Accordingly, inclusive positivism holds the advantage of being more consilient than interpretivism, which is arguably parochial.
I will discuss issues which can be seen as taken strictly from the science fiction literature. Nonetheless, I would like to demonstrate that those issues not so far from now will have a big influence on the ethical discourse and also the law and social philosophy. The first part aims at clarifying concept of “cyborg” and “cyborgization”. I will consider only meanings coined for scientific or philosophical purposes. I will also indicate two experiments, which bring to life “the first cyborg” – term in which the head-scientist of these experiments used to describe his effects. In the second part I will show ideas of transhumanists in the context of technological achievements mentioned earlier. I will concentrate on the human enhancement idea, underling majority of transhumanist’s branches. I will try to demonstrate that it is realistic concept. In the third part I will shift my attention to some of consequences which flow from “cyborgisation” and human enhancements mentioned in prior parts. I will present two rights seen by transhumanist’s philosophers as able to become human rights in the near future. In these frames I will consider the “morphological freedom” and the “cognitive liberty”. At the end, in the fourth part I will summarize my considerations about the influence of semi-fictitious technologies. I will try to bring on an unambiguous conclusion that aforesaid issues could in the nearest future become very substantial for every area of the theory and policy of law.
The author will deal with the relationship between law and technology from the viewpoint of technology security standard. One of the relationships can be found in that law has been providing a security level of technology. They have been saying that law would often follow technology. Law is too slow to adapt the changing technology through the advancement of technology. Above all, information technology has an electronic rapidity and a legislation technology has a paper one. There might be a big estrangement between law and technology. However, law must provide a security standard of technology. The standard must be based on a relative security level. The relative level would premise on the ordinary, lawful and ethical use of technology. Most technology has been opened to the public without any technology impact assessment. Technology would have some defect, which the producers have overlooked. As a result, the users might often meet with the accidents caused on the defects.
Then law should provide a technology security standard to exclude the defects from the users’ viewpoint as secure as possible. The security standard must be reflected on the architecture standard of technology. The architecture standard may be a yardstick whether the creators can evade the responsibility for the accidents.
The standard would also premise on the ordinary, lawful and ethical use of technology. The ordinary use means that the users should use normally technology within the extent of the architecture standard. The ethical use means that the users should use technology being conscious of the defects in order to avoid accidents.
The relative security level may be the sum of the architecture standard and the ethical use of technology.
Civil Society became an important theme in the recent discussion of political or social theory. Civil Society is playing a substantial role for the legislation process. We can find it especially in the activities of international NGO. It gives a new aspect of the relationship between state and society, and legal philosophically speaking, of validity of law. Activities of Civil Society are socially recognized and their support systems are gradually institutionalized also domestic in Japan. But Japanese NPO has its own weak point, which arises from the political structure of our society.
Scientific and technical achievements can cause deep changes in spheres of morals and law. I am going to discuss some philosophical conclusions which follow from two significant ideas of contemporary civilization. First of them is a thesis about indistinguishability of natural from artificial, and the second one is an opportunity of creation of artificial human.
The first thesis is a consequence of the principle of relativity of physical reality to conditions and a way of observation, on which both interpretations of quantum theory and Einstein’s theories of relativity are based. I show that the given principle deprives us of objective criteria to distinguish natural from artificial, freedom from necessity, freedom from violence.
Today power of technique is directed not only on the external world, but also on a person. Due to information technology, and biotechnology an opportunity of creation of artificial and controlled individual increases. So human loses many features of a person and transforms to a part of a collective super individual subject. In modern time a search of the transcendental basis of law and power leads to impersonal human and recognition of super individuality.
Traditional belief about natural rights will disappear. There is necessity of revision of such concept as right of freedom. Liberal belief about freedom as a condition of human existence is changing. Prospects of technical development make justified R. Dworkin's reflections about superiority of right of equality in comparison with right of freedom.