scholarly journals The Image of the Ancient Jewish Ruler and Autocratic Power During the Formation of Statehood (Based on the Materials of the Hebrew Bible)

2021 ◽  
Vol 8 (4) ◽  
pp. 365-374
Author(s):  
Andrey A. Kovalev
Keyword(s):  
Hebrew Bible ◽  
Separation Of Powers ◽  
Humanitarian Law ◽  
Checks And Balances ◽  
The Bible ◽  
The People ◽  
System Method ◽  
State Administration ◽  
Continuous Work ◽  
Ancient Texts

The relevance of the study lies in the fact that the ancient texts of the Hebrew Bible largely anticipated the political and legal achievements of the last centuries. The Tanakh, additions and commentaries to it determine the direction of modern international humanitarian law, ways of forming state administration, lay the foundations of a system of checks and balances, a system of separation of powers, contain the foundations of the contractual theory of the origin of the state by concluding an agreement between the people and the king. The purpose of this study is to analyze the ancient texts of the Hebrew Bible and update the obtained data in modern political and managerial relations. Some texts of the Hebrew Bible (Tanakh), authoritative commentaries on them and the results of research by domestic and foreign scientists were used as materials for the study. The research methods were comparison, analysis of documents, and the system method. The conducted research concluded that doubts about the historicity and practical reliability of the texts of the Hebrew Bible are not able to affect the indisputable value of the material contained in it. Even if the events described have never taken place in history, the views expressed in the Bible themselves should be recognized as far ahead of their time and of value for modern political science. The Hebrew Bible defines the representative of the autocratic power (the king) as the first among equals. This applies to rights, duties, and responsibilities. It is this postulate that should be embedded in the modern political and managerial system, in which there is always a manager and performers. And only continuous work (primarily on oneself), self-improvement, as the Hebrew Bible bequeathed, should become the criterion for selecting a leader, and not any preferences.

The Constitution of the Roman Republic

2020 ◽  
pp. 47-84
Author(s):  
Eric A. Posner
Keyword(s):  
Roman Republic ◽  
Agency Theory ◽  
Separation Of Powers ◽  
The Political ◽  
American Constitution ◽  
Political Class ◽  
Checks And Balances ◽  
Military Forces ◽  
The People ◽  
Governmental Functions

The constitution of the Roman Republic featured a system of checks and balances that would eventually influence the American founders, yet it was very different from the system of separation of powers that the founders created. The Roman senate gave advice but did not legislate; the people voted directly on bills and appointments in popular assemblies; and a group of magistrates, led by a pair of consuls, proposed bills, brought prosecutions, served as judges, led military forces, and performed other governmental functions. This chapter analyzes the Roman constitution from the perspective of agency theory, and argues that the extensive checks and balances, which were intended to prevent the recurrence of monarchy, may have gone too far. Suitable for an earlier period in which the population was small and the political class was homogenous, the constitution proved unworkable when Rome acquired a vast, diverse empire. The lessons of Roman constitutionalism for the American constitution are also discussed.

scholarly journals Are There “Sources of Resilience” When the Separation of Powers Breaks Down?

2021 ◽  
Vol 30 (4) ◽  
pp. 25-36
Author(s):  
Arjun Tremblay
Keyword(s):  
Political Power ◽  
Separation Of Powers ◽  
The Political ◽  
Political Ambition ◽  
Checks And Balances ◽  
The People ◽  
Legislative Branch ◽  
Parliamentary Systems ◽  
The Many ◽  
The One

Jacob Levy describes three variants of the separation of powers in the 31st Annual McDonald Lecture in Constitutional Studies, only one of which is germane to this reflection. The first variant he describes is based solely on the independence of the judiciary from both the executive and legislative branches of governments; consequently, this variant encompasses both presidential and parliamentary systems under its conceptual ambit. Another variant, which Levy attributes to Montesquieu, envisages the separation of powers between executive, judicial, and legislative branches as a way of allowing for the “pooled”1 rule of “the one” (i.e. monarch), “the few” (i.e. aristocrats), and “the many” (i.e. the people). Levy also describes a distinctly American variant of the separation of powers undergirded by a system of checks and balances. This variant was designed to ensure “mutual monitoring between executive and legislative”2 and it vests the legislative branch with the power to impeach the executive in order to “maintain effective limits on the political power and the political ambition of the president.”3

scholarly journals Gagasan Penyempurnaan Lembaga Majelis Permusyawaratan Rakyat Republik Indonesia dalam Sistem Parlemen Dua Kamar

PLENO JURE ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 9 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-15
Author(s):  
Rizki Ramadani
Keyword(s):  
Separation Of Powers ◽  
State Power ◽  
State Institution ◽  
Fifth Amendment ◽  
Checks And Balances ◽  
Parliamentary System ◽  
The People ◽  
The Republic ◽  
To Come

Berdasarkan Pasal 1 ayat (2) UUD 1945 Sebelum Perubahan dan Penjelasannya, kekuasaan Negara yang tertinggi ada di tangan MPR. Sejak itu telah ada pengakuan bahwa MPR merupakan Lembaga Tertinggi Negara, bahkan sebagai penjelmaan seluruh rakyat Indonesia. Pasca Amandemen, UUD NRI Tahun 1945 resmi menganut pemisahan kekuasaan dengan ‘checks and balances’ yang lebih fungsional. Implikasinya, MPR kehilangan sebagian fungsi dan wewenangnya, dan tidak lagi berkedudukan sebagai lembaga tertinggi negara. Kini, bersamaan dengan munculnya wacana amandemen kelima, timbul pula pembicaraan untuk mereformulasi peran dan kelembagaan MPR. Artikel ini berupaya merespon wacana secara obyektif dengan berupaya memunculkan gagasan penyempurnaan MPR dengan pendekatan konsep parlemen dua kamar. Gagasan tersebut adalah melalui penegasan posisi kelembagaan MPR dalam sistem parlemen dua kamar dan perimbangan kekuasaan antar kamar. Abstract. Based on Article 1 paragraph (2) of the 1945 Constitution Before the Amendment and its Elucidation, the highest state power is in the hands of the MPR. Since then there has been recognition that the MPR is the Supreme State Institution, even as the manifestation of all the people of Indonesia. After the Amendment, the 1945 Constitution of the Republic of Indonesia officially adopted a more functional separation of powers with more functional checks and balances, making the MPR lost the vital parts of its functions and authority, and no longer has the position of the highest state institution. Now, along with the emergence of the discourse of the fifth amendment, discussions also emerged to reform the role and institutions of the MPR. This article attempts to respond to the discourse objectively by trying to come up with the idea of ​​perfecting the MPR with the concept of a two-chamber parliamentary approach. The ideas were, through the affirmation of the institutional position of the MPR in the two-chamber parliamentary system and the balance of powers between chambers.

scholarly journals Re-Examining Israelite Patriarchy through Marriage Laws of Deuteronomy

Spectrum ◽  
2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Hyun-Joo Lim
Keyword(s):  
Gender Equality ◽  
Hebrew Bible ◽  
Near East ◽  
Historical Context ◽  
Ancient Near East ◽  
The Bible ◽  
The People ◽  
The Common ◽  
Marriage Laws ◽  
Extensive List

The book of Deuteronomy in the Hebrew Bible contains an extensive list of laws, from cultic regulations tolaws addressing everyday affairs. As a legal collection, it can be observed as a symbol of practices and valuesof the ancient Israelites (the people by and for whom the Hebrew Bible was formed). Many prescriptionsin the Bible are perplexing and controversial according to our modern Western standards, especially thoseregarding gender equality in marital provisions. This essay examines the marriage laws of Deuteronomywithin its specific geographical, cultural, and historical context (the ancient Near East) including comparisonsto various law codes of nearby regional and other Biblical traditions, to argue that perspectives found inDeuteronomy are relatively progressive in protecting women’s rights. I challenge the common and oftenunquestioned assumption amongst scholars, religious followers and general readers that the Bible is sexistand misogynistic. More broadly, I advocate for the need to assess historical and religious works on gender intheir appropriate context, in order to obtain a more complex and earnest understanding of ancient traditions.1

History of Ancient Israel

2015 ◽  
Author(s):  
H. G. M. Williamson
Keyword(s):  
Old Testament ◽  
Hebrew Bible ◽  
Literary Analysis ◽  
The Bible ◽  
The People ◽  
Ancient Israel ◽  
History Of ◽  
External Sources ◽  
Historical Reliability ◽  
The 19Th Century

The history of ancient Israel is best known to most people from the narratives in the Hebrew Bible/Old Testament. There, however, the name “Israel” covers a wide diversity of social and political entities over the course of many centuries. The first attestation of the name outside the Bible (on the Egyptian stela of Merneptah, c. 1208 bce) seems to refer at most to some ill-defined tribal federation. It then served for at least two different monarchies and later again as a social or religious title for the people who inhabited the Achaemenid (Persian) province of Yehud. The value of the biblical written records varies considerably with regard to historical content, and this must further be evaluated on the basis of internal literary analysis and in the light of evidence that comes from archaeological research, including in particular from epigraphic sources both from Israel itself and from many near and more distant nations. How to combine these differing forms of evidence has been the topic of lively and sometimes rancorous debate, which varies in its detail from one period to another, often depending on the extent to which external sources are immediately available. Solutions are not always available, but exploration into the nature of these problems and misunderstandings in the application of appropriate methods reveal where the problems lie and, in some cases, what are plausible solutions. Until the 19th century, the history of ancient Israel was, for most people, coterminous with the familiar narrative of the Old Testament/Hebrew Bible. No relevant external sources were known, and there was no reason to doubt its essential historical reliability, allowance made, of course, for those who could not accept the miraculous as historically factual. Archaeological and epigraphical discoveries over the last two centuries or so, together with the introduction more recently of new and different historical methods, have led to aspects of this topic being fiercely contested in current scholarship. Taking a general familiarity with the outline “story” for granted, the following analysis will present some of the major topics on which new data have become available and on which opinion remains divided.

Indonesia

2021 ◽  
pp. 251-266
Author(s):  
Steven Gow Calabresi
Keyword(s):  
Supreme Court ◽  
Judicial Review ◽  
Separation Of Powers ◽  
Freedom Of Expression ◽  
Constitutional Court ◽  
Constitutional Democracy ◽  
Checks And Balances ◽  
American Perspective ◽  
The People ◽  
The Supreme Court

This chapter highlights the origins and growth of Indonesian judicial review. Indonesia today is a constitutional democracy that has attained surprising success in eliminating hyper-presidentialism by implementing important checks and balances on presidential power; by separating executive, legislative, and judicial power; and by attaining rapidly an astonishing amount of decentralization since 1998. That degree of checks and balances and of decentralization has undoubtedly made Indonesians much freer than they were under President Suharto’s dictatorship. The Indonesian Constitutional Court seems to function well and enjoys the confidence of the people. Looked at from an American perspective, however, Indonesia is a constitutional democracy, which does not yet fully protect freedom of expression, freedom of religion, or economic freedoms to the extent that those freedoms are protected by the U.S. Supreme Court. Indonesia’s Bill of Rights and its system of judicial review originated for rights from wrongs reasons, because of borrowing, and because power is sufficiently divided in Indonesia, as a result of the separation of powers and federalism, so that there is political space in which the Supreme Court can operate.

scholarly journals Explaining the Riddle of America: What Europeans Should Know about Madisonian Democracy

2011 ◽  
Vol 4 (2) ◽  
pp. 255-268
Author(s):  
Laurence E. Lynn
Keyword(s):  
Separation Of Powers ◽  
Well Being ◽  
The United States ◽  
Structural Features ◽  
Policy Outcomes ◽  
James Madison ◽  
Checks And Balances ◽  
Political Crises ◽  
The People ◽  
Equal Importance

Long a puzzle to both its admirers and detractors across the world, the United States of America has, in the second decade of the twenty-first century, become more puzzling than ever. A variety of explanations has been proposed for America’s paradoxical combination of apparent “statelessness” and its capability to produce positive policy outcomes. This essay will argue that, properly understood, the structural features of America’s constitutional scheme of governance, largely credited to founder James Madison, provide a necessary but insufficient explanation of the “riddle of America”. The success of America’s “compound republic” (in Madison’s words), was intended to depend not only on the capacities of its basic governing structures – separation of powers, checks and balances, federalism, and pluralism – but, in extremis, on the inherent fairness of “the people”, both of which have been achieved in American history but neither of which can be guaranteed. The source of authority and, of equal importance, the legitimacy of American governing institutions and their outcomes is the faith placed in them by citizens, elected officials, and judges, requiring a sense of responsibility on the part of all to the principles that protect all. That the sense of responsibility on the part of some, as America’s recent political crises demonstrates, can fail, jeopardizes not only domestic liberty and justice but threatens the well being of peoples far distant.

ЕКАТЕРИНА ВЕЛИКАЯ И ДИАЛЕКТИКА ПРОСВЕЩЕННОЙ МОНАРХИИ

2020 ◽  
Vol 15 (1) ◽  
pp. 39
Author(s):  
С. И. Дудник ◽  
И. Д. Осипов
Keyword(s):  
Cultural Policy ◽  
Separation Of Powers ◽  
Point Of View ◽  
Human Sciences ◽  
The Rule Of Law ◽  
Political Ideas ◽  
The People ◽  
Specific Interpretation ◽  
The Difference ◽  
Conservative Values

The article discusses the problems of evolution and the formation of the ideology of an enlightened monarchy in Russia. In this regard, the philosophical and political ideas of Catherine the Great, as well as their theoretical and ideological premises, are analyzed. It is noted that the philosophy of education in Russia was closely connected with the concepts of Voltaire, Didro, Montesquieu, Beccaria, Bentham, their views on natural law and human freedom, humanism and the rule of law. These concepts in the philosophy of Catherine received a specific interpretation, due to the sociocultural conditions of Russia. This was manifested in the famous work of Catherine the Great “The Nakaz”, which recognized Montesquieu's argument in favor of the autocracy, but at the same time, his point of view on the separation of powers was rejected. The specificity of the doctrine of enlightened monarchy lies in the combination of liberal and conservative values, which form eclectic forms. This was the dialectic of the supreme power, the difference between the enlightened monarchy and the ideology of absolutism. The article also notes that education in Russia is associated with fundamental socio-political reforms, processes of secularization of culture. At this time, the natural and human sciences are developing. The changes positively influenced the development of medicine, beautification of towns and public education. Also considered are the views on the autocracy of the opposition nobility intelligentsia: A. N. Radishchev and noted that his criticism of the autocracy was determined by an alternative cultural policy, proceeding from the protection of the interests of the people. The doctrine of enlightened monarchy is characterized by internal worldview inconsistency and political inconsistency, which did not allow solving the pressing social problems of the establishment of legal state, democratization of society and the abolition of serfdom.

Institutional organisation of the European Union in the time of crisis – horizontal division of power and functions

2016 ◽  
pp. 54-66
Author(s):  
Monika Poboży
Keyword(s):  
European Union ◽  
Separation Of Powers ◽  
European Council ◽  
Executive Power ◽  
The European Union ◽  
Checks And Balances ◽  
Court Of Justice ◽  
Strong Position ◽  
Institutional System ◽  
The Eu

The article poses a question about the existence of the rule of separation of powers in the EU institutional system, as it is suggested by the wording of the treaties. The analysis led to the conclusion, that in the EU institutional system there are three separated functions (powers) assigned to different institutions. The Council and the European Parliament are legislative powers, the Commission and the European Council create a “divided executive”. The Court of Justice is a judicial power. The above mentioned institutions gained strong position within their main functions (legislative, executive, judicial), but the proper mechanisms of checks and balances have not been developed, especially in the relations between legislative and executive power. These powers do not limit one another in the EU system. In the EU there are therefore three separated but arbitrary powers – because they do not limit and balance one another, and are not fully controlled by the member states.

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