The Long Arc of Legality

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
David Dyzenhaus

The Long Arc of Legality breaks the current deadlock in philosophy of law between legal positivism and natural law by showing that any understanding of law as a matter of authority must account for the interaction of enacted law with fundamental principles of legality. This interaction conditions law's content so that officials have the moral resources to answer the legal subject's question, 'But, how can that be law for me?' David Dyzenhaus brings Thomas Hobbes and Hans Kelsen into a dialogue with H. L. A. Hart, showing that philosophy of law must work with the idea of legitimate authority and its basis in the social contract. He argues that the legality of international law and constitutional law are integral to the main tasks of philosophy of law, and that legal theory must attend both to the politics of legal space and to the way in which law provides us with a 'public conscience'.

2009 ◽  
Vol 22 (2) ◽  
pp. 225-249 ◽  
Author(s):  
JÖRG KAMMERHOFER

AbstractHans Kelsen is known both as a legal theorist and as an international lawyer. This article shows that his theory of international law is an integral part of the Kelsenian Pure Theory of Law. Two areas of international law are analysed: first, Kelsen's coercive order paradigm and its relationship to the bellum iustum doctrine; second, the Kelsenian notion of the unity of all law vis-à-vis theories of the relationship of international and municipal law. In a second step, the results of Kelsenian general legal theory of the late period – as interpreted and developed by the present author – are reapplied to selected doctrines of international law. Thus is the coercive order paradigm resolved, the unity of law dissolved, and the UN Charter reinterpreted to show that the concretization of norms as positive international law cannot be unmade by a scholarship usurping the right to make law.


2020 ◽  
pp. 97-141
Author(s):  
Raymond Wacks

This chapter explores the works of some of the leading exponents of contemporary legal positivism: H. L. A. Hart, Hans Kelsen, Joseph Raz, Jules Coleman, Scott Shapiro, and others. Hart staked out the borders of modern legal theory by applying the techniques of analytical (and especially linguistic) philosophy to the study of law. Kelsen may be the least understood and most misrepresented of all legal theorists. To the extent that he insisted on the separation of law and morals, what ‘is’ (sein) and what ‘ought to be’ (sollen), Kelsen may legitimately be characterized as a legal positivist, but he is a good deal more. Raz argues that the identity and existence of a legal system may be tested by reference to three elements: efficacy, institutional character, and sources. Thus, law is autonomous: we can identify its content without recourse to morality.


2016 ◽  
Vol 29 (3) ◽  
pp. 641-666 ◽  
Author(s):  
AKBAR RASULOV

AbstractA certain body of mythology has emerged in recent years around Martti Koskenniemi's From Apology to Utopia (FATU). At its heart lies a group of received wisdoms that tell us that FATU should essentially be considered a work of postmodern scholarship, that it provides a typical illustration of the so-called deconstructivist approach, and that its single most significant contribution to the field of international legal theory lies in its discussion of the subject of legal indeterminacy. In this article, I seek to challenge and displace this set of narratives, by excavating and restoring to the surface FATU's original intellectual project: a highly ambitious attempt to revive the traditional enterprise of ‘legal science’ by marrying Kelsenian legal positivism with Saussurean structuralist semiotics. In doing so, it succeeded in developing a set of analytical idioms and reasoning protocols that gave the international law profession not only a reason but also the necessary intellectual materials to revolutionize its day to day understanding of the essential character of international legal practice. Thus, far from being a manifestation of any kind of postmodernist sensibility, FATU, I am going to argue, represents, in fact, the exact opposite of it.


2016 ◽  
Vol 29 (2) ◽  
pp. 289-316 ◽  
Author(s):  
SAMANTHA BESSON

AbstractThis article starts with a paradox: international law-making is ridden with reasonable disagreement and yet no state can be bound by international law without its consent and hence without agreement. Breaking away from the pragmatic resignation that prevails among international law scholars on this question, the article proposes an interpretation of the role of state consent that both fits and justifies its central role in the practice of international law-making and, hopefully, strengthens the latter's legitimacy in the future. Its proposed justification actually lies in the circumstances of reasonable disagreement among democratic states and this proposal dissolves the paradox. The article argues that, in international law as it is the case domestically, consent is neither a criterion of validity of law nor a ground for its legitimate authority. It also dispels two myths about state consent: its necessary relationship to legal positivism and state sovereignty. Instead, the article argues, the role of democratic state consent is that of an exception to the legitimate authority of international law and hence to its bindingness in a concrete case. While the legitimacy of international law is not democratic, the democratic nature of states and their democratic accountability to their people matter. This is especially the case in circumstances of widespread and persistent reasonable disagreement as they prevail among democratic states in international law-making. In these circumstances, respecting the sovereign equality of democratic states by requiring their consent is the way to grant an equal voice to their people. Of course, there are limits to the democratic state exception that are inherent to both its democratic dimension (it requires respecting basic political equality) and its consensual dimension (it requires that consent is expressed in a free, fair and informed fashion). The article concludes by showing how the proposed disagreement-attuned account of democratic state consent explains various characteristics of the main international law-making processes, i.e., treaties and custom.


Author(s):  
Philipp Reimer

»L’ÉTAT, C’EST LE DROIT!« – SOBRE A ATUALIDADE DA TEORIA DO ESTADO DE HANS KELSEN EM FACE DA METAMORFOSE DO PODER ESTATAL*  »L’ÉTAT, C’EST LE DROIT!« - ZUR AKTUALITÄT DER STAATSLEHRE HANS KELSENS IM ANGESICHT SICH WANDELNDER STAATSGEWALT  »L’ÉTAT, C’EST LE DROIT!« - THE CURRENT IMPORTANCE OF HANS KELSEN'S STATE DOCTRINE IN LIGHT OF THE STATE POWER CHANGES   Philipp Reimer**  RESUMO: Confrontada com evidentes mutações na estruturação de instituições e atividades estatais, a teoria do direito pode nos dizer que aspectos deste processo de metamorfose devem ser considerados pelos estudos jurídicos – bem como quais aspectos não precisam ser levados em conta. Fazendo uso de uma abordagem kelseniana, este artigo demonstra como a teoria do direito (compreendida como disciplina normativa) não enfrenta quaisquer dificuldades ao lidar com fenômenos da ordem do dia tais quais „soft law“, „governo de múltiplos níveis“ ou „pluralismo jurídico“. A distinção entre normativo e empírico é a chave interpretativa, aqui, de tal forma que a investigação desta última esfera pertence ao domínio das ciências sociais e não da teoria do direito. PALAVRAS-CHAVE: Identidade entre Estado e direito. Hans Kelsen. Teoria pura do direito. Teoria normativa. Pluralismo jurídico. ABSTRACT: When facing eminent change of the way government institutions and activities are structured, legal theory can tell us in what respects legal scholarship needs to take account of such change - and also, in what respects is does not. Using a Kelsenian approach, this paper shows how legal theory (understood as a normative discipline) has no difficulty in coping with modern-day phenomena such as "soft law", "multi-level government", and "legal pluralism". The distinction of the normative and the empirical is key here, where the study of the latter falls into the domain of the social sciences, not legal theory. KEYWORDS: Identity of legal order and state. Hans Kelsen. Pure theory of law. Normative theory. Legal pluralism. SUMÁRIO: 1 Transformação do Estado – de que Estado? 1.1 Um Estado, duas dimensões, três elementos? 1.2 Diferenciação dos conceitos de Estado. 1.3 Conceito teórico-jurídico de Estado e transformação do Estado. 2 Transformações do conteúdo do direito. 2.1 Autorregulação. 2.2 »Soft law«. 3 Transformação da estrutura do direito: Substituição do Estado. 3.1 »Sistemas de múltiplos níveis« e »pluralismo jurídico« como (aparente) desafio a um teoria do direito centrada no Estado. 3.1.1 »Sistemas de múltiplos níveis«. 3.1.2 »Pluralismo jurídico«. 3.2 Substituição, não transformação do Estado. 3.2.1 A antiquada teoria do direito centrada no Estado como quimera. 3.2.2 A necessária unidade da perspectiva jurídica da ciência normativa. 3.2.2.1 Derrogação apenas internamente a uma ordem jurídica. 3.2.2.2 Construção do direito internacional público e do direito europeu. 3.2.3 O caráter arbitrário da escolha do ponto de partida da abordagem jurídica. Conclusão – perspectivas científico-normativas e científico-sociais sobre a “transformação do Estado”. Referências Bibliográficas. * Publicação original: REIMER, Philipp. »L’État, c’est le droit!« - Zur Aktualität der Staatslehre Hans Kelsens im Angesicht sich wandelnder Staatsgewalt. In: HESCHL, Lisa et seq (Eds.). L'État, c'est quoi? Staatsgewalt im Wandel. 54. Assistententagung Öffentliches Recht. Graz: Helbing & Lichtenhahn, 2014, p. 37-57. Traduzido por Rodrigo Garcia Cadore, doutorando em Teoria do Direito e Direito Público pela Universidade de Freiburg (Albert-Ludwigs-Universität Freiburg), Alemanha, com autorização do autor.** Livre-docente em Direito Público e Teoria do Direito pela Universidade de Freiburg (Albert-Ludwigs-Universität Freiburg), Alemanha. Professor Privatdozent na Faculdade de Direito da Universidade de Mainz (Johannes Gutenberg Universität Mainz), Alemanha.


Author(s):  
David Lefkowitz

This chapter begins by examining the case for legal positivism. Legal positivism is understood as the thesis that the existence of law is a matter of its social source, regardless of its merits. Descriptive, normative, and conceptual arguments are considered, with the aim of demonstrating that what follows for the sources of international law from the commitment to positivism depends on the specific defence offered for accepting it as an account of the nature of law. The remainder of the chapter examines the possibility of customary international law: given that custom can and does serve as a source of international law, positivists owe a plausible account of how customary rules are made or posited. A preliminary argument for the compatibility of the normative practice account of custom with the respective arguments of Hans Kelsen and Joseph Raz for legal positivism brings the chapter to a close.


This volume provides a forum for some of the best new philosophical work on law, by both senior and junior scholars from around the world. The chapters range widely over issues in general jurisprudence (the nature of law, adjudication, and legal reasoning); the philosophical foundations of specific areas of law (from criminal law to evidence to international law); the history of legal philosophy; and related philosophical topics that illuminate the problems of legal theory.


2019 ◽  
Vol 22 (1) ◽  
pp. 234-283
Author(s):  
William E. Conklin

This article examines the place of Nomadic peoples in an international constitutionalism. The article claims that an important element of a Nomadic culture is its sense of law. Such a sense of law differs from a constitutionalism which has privileged fundamental principles aimed to constrain acts of the executive arm of the State. Such a constitutionalism is shared by many contemporary domestic legal orders. Public international law also takes such a constitutionalism for granted. In the focus upon rules to constrain the executive arm of the State, the sense of law in Nomadic communities has slipped through arguments which the jurist might consider inclusive of the protection of such communities. This problem is nested in a legacy which has weighted down the history of European legal thought. The article initially identifies three forms of nomadism. The social phenomenon of nomadism has been the object of juristic commentary since the Greeks and Romans. The image of Nomadic peoples in such a legacy has imagined Nomadic peoples as lawless although the article argues that a sense of law has existed in such communities. Such a sense of law contradicts a State-centric international legal order. Public international law has reserved a special legal space relating to Nomadic peoples. The article identifies four arguments which might be rendered to protect Nomadic peoples in such a State-centric international community. Problems are raised with each such argument


2015 ◽  
Vol 16 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
David Dyzenhaus

AbstractEyal Benvenisti has sought to provide an optimistic account of international law through reconceptualizing the idea of sovereignty as a kind of trusteeship for humanity. He thus sketches a welcome antidote to trends in recent work in public law including public international law that claim that international law is no more than a cloak for economic and political interests, so that all that matters is which powerful actor gets to decide. In this Article, I approach his position through a discussion of the debate in Weimar about sovereignty between Carl Schmitt, Hans Kelsen and Hermann Heller. I try to show that Heller’s almost unknown legal theory might be helpful to Benvenisti’s position. Heller shared with Schmitt the idea that sovereignty had to have a central role in legal theory and that its role includes a place for a final legal decision. Indeed, much more than Schmitt, Heller regarded all accounts of sovereignty as inherently political. However, in a manner closer to the spirit of Kelsen’s enterprise than to Schmitt’s, he wished to emphasize that the ultimate decider - the sovereign decision unit of the political order of liberal democracy - is entirely legally constituted. Moreover, Heller argued that fundamental principles of legality condition the exercise of a sovereign power in a way that explains the specific legitimacy of legality and which might supply the link between sovereignty and ideas such as trusteeship and humanity.


2011 ◽  
Vol 24 (2) ◽  
pp. 409-430
Author(s):  
David Dyzenhaus

I argue that attention to Austin helps us to appreciate that there are significant continuities between his legal theory and that of contemporary positivists; hence, to the extent that Austin’s theory has defects, these are reproduced in the work of contemporary legal positivism. An historical perspective on contemporary philosophy of law thus permits one to appreciate that the basic divide in legal theory is between a tradition whose basic intuition is that law is answerable to a moral ideal of legality and the positivist tradition that sees law as the transmitter of political judgment. For the former, the rule of law tradition, the basic problem for philosophy of law is to explain the distinction between the rule of law and the arbitrary rule of men. For the latter, the rule by law tradition, the basic problem is to explain how law can effectively transmit the judgments made political elites. The rule by law tradition encounters severe difficulties in making sense of the idea of government according to law, difficulties which reach their height once legal positivists accept, following Hart, that philosophy of law has to understand law as a normative phenomenon, which in turns requires taking seriously the internal point of view of legal officials.


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