Natural Law, the Law of Nations, and the Transition to Natural Rights

2009 ◽  
pp. 69-100
Author(s):  
DAVID BOUCHER
Keyword(s):  
Natural Law ◽  
Natural Rights ◽  
Law Of Nations ◽  
The Law

scholarly journals On what a theory of natural law is supposed to be

2020 ◽  
pp. 167-200
Author(s):  
Michael Pakaluk
Keyword(s):  
Natural Law ◽  
Natural Rights ◽  
Philosophical Work ◽  
Natural Teleology ◽  
Law And Morality ◽  
The Law ◽  
John Finnis ◽  
The Many ◽  
Locus Classicus

A theory may properly be called a theory of natural law, if either it functions as such a theory is expected to function; or it has the expected content; or it is a plausible interpretation of a theory generally acknowledged to be in the tradition of natural law. It functions as such a theory if it supports appeals to natural law intended to ‘contextualize’ human law. It has the expected content, if it adverts to providential, natural teleology as the basis for a law given to us prior to convention. It would clearly be located in the tradition, and rightly accounted as such a theory, if it were a plausible interpretation of Aquinas’ Treatise on Law, which is the locus classicus for the philosophical treatment of natural law. But the ‘New Natural Law,’ first expounded in Natural Law and Natural Rights (NLNR) of John Finnis, meets none of these criteria. NLNR seems best construed, then, as a contribution to the «law and morality » debate, not a theory of natural law. It gives merely another ‘method of ethics’ along with the many others put forward in the 20th c. If so, the philosophical work needed for a persuasive, contemporary revival of natural law still remains to be done.

The liberal-communitarian debate in contemporary political philosophy and its significance for international relations

2000 ◽  
Vol 26 (2) ◽  
pp. 233-251 ◽  
Author(s):  
DAVID MORRICE
Keyword(s):  
Political Philosophy ◽  
International Relations ◽  
Natural Law ◽  
International Relations Theory ◽  
Moral Integrity ◽  
World Government ◽  
Moral Reality ◽  
False Dichotomy ◽  
Law Of Nations ◽  
The Law

This article examines the debate between liberalism and communitarianism in contemporary political philosophy and considers its significance for international relations. The debate tends to pose a false dichotomy between liberalism and communitarianism, and neither position alone can provide an adequate basis for international relations theory. It is necessary to go beyond the liberal-communitarian divide in order to reconcile the valuable insights that may be rescued from both positions. There is a community which is a moral reality, which includes all individuals and maintains their moral integrity, and which can accommodate all legitimate, smaller communities. This is the community of humanity, which is recognized in traditional theories of natural law and the law of nations. The article concludes by considering whether the universal community of humanity requires and justifies world government.

Part I Histories, Ch.3 Transformations of Natural Law: Germany 1648–1815

2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
Koskenniemi Martti
Keyword(s):  
Natural Law ◽  
Public Law ◽  
Western Modernity ◽  
Law Of Nations ◽  
External Events ◽  
Legislative Policies ◽  
The Law ◽  
International Power

This chapter examines the transformation of ideas about international power that took place in the idiom of natural law between 1648 and 1815, a key period of early Western modernity. Pressed in part by external events and in part by developments in the relations between the Holy Roman Empire’s constituent units, university jurists switched between abstract justification of the imperial structure and deliberating the technical merits of alternative legislative policies. These debates had an immediate relevance to how German jurists conceived jus gentium (the law of nations) and why they would finally discuss it under the title of ‘public law of Europe’. Thus, the transformations of natural law in the period 1648–1815 constructed and delimited the ways in which what is settled in the international world and what is open for political contestation was to be conceived up to the present.

Le Droit des Nations aux Indes Orientales Aux XVIE, XVIIE, XVIIIE siècles (1964)

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
C. H. Alexandrowicz
Keyword(s):  
Nineteenth Century ◽  
Indian Ocean ◽  
Natural Law ◽  
European Law ◽  
Historical Reality ◽  
Law Of Nations ◽  
The Family ◽  
The Indian Ocean ◽  
Territorial Rights ◽  
The Law

This chapter challenges the projection of nineteenth-century assumptions onto the historical reality of the sixteenth through eighteenth centuries by arguing that the earlier transactions between European and Asian powers took place under the rubric of the law of nations. The classical European authors founded their theories on natural law and considered the family of nations universal, and Europeans acquired territorial rights in Asia in accord with principles of European law, through conquest or treaties of cession. The law of nations in Europe at this time was still in formation, and juridical developments were affected by the practice of states in the Indian Ocean. The chapter considers uncertainties and debates around sovereignty (vassals, suzerains, trading companies), territorial title, and maritime law, particularly in the controversy between Grotius and Freitas, and the rise of discriminatory monopolistic treaties that restricted Asian sovereigns’ ability to deal with more than one European power.

The Influence of the Law of Nature Upon International Law in the United States

1909 ◽  
Vol 3 (3) ◽  
pp. 547-561 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jesse S. Reeves
Keyword(s):  
International Law ◽  
Modern Science ◽  
The United States ◽  
Natural Rights ◽  
Roman Law ◽  
Traditional System ◽  
Law Of Nature ◽  
Law Of Nations ◽  
The Law ◽  
Scholastic Philosophy

The political philosophers of the eighteenth century might have been surprised if told that their favorite doctrine of natural rights was the intellectual successor of certain theories of the Roman law and of the scholasticism of Saint Thomas Aquinas. Yet the “ state of nature,” which filled so large a place in the discussion of natural rights, has been called “ an exaggerated perversion of what, in traditional system, was quite a subordinant point” From Locke to Hooker, and back through the scholastic philosophy, the germ of natural rights has been traced to the jus naturœ and the jus gentium of the Roman law. Grotius and his successors preserved the tradition in another and more direct line. The continuity of Grotius with the doctrine of the Roman law was complete. “ The law of nature,” said Holland, “ is the foundation, or rather the scaffolding, upon which the modern science of International Law was built up by Gentilis and Grotius. The change in the meaning of jus gentium made by Grotius and his successors, and the influence which the jus naturœ had in forming the new conception of the law of nations can only be referred to here.

A Short History of International Law

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Stephen C Neff
Keyword(s):  
International Law ◽  
Middle Ages ◽  
Natural Law ◽  
League Of Nations ◽  
Ancient World ◽  
Classical Period ◽  
Law Of Nations ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Law ◽  
History Of International Law

This chapter presents a brief history of international law. It proceeds chronologically, beginning with an overview of the ancient world, followed by a more detailed discussion of the great era of natural law in the European Middle Ages. The classical period (1600–1815) witnessed the emergence of a dualistic view of international law, with the law of nature and the law of nations co-existing (more or less amicably). In the nineteenth century—the least-known part of international law—doctrinaire positivism was the prevailing viewpoint, though not the exclusive one. For the inter-war years, developments both inside and outside the League of Nations are considered. The chapter concludes with some historically oriented comments on international law during the post-1945 period.

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