. Can the label “law” apply to rules as amoral as the enactments of the Nazis? This question confronted the courts in Germany after 1945. In dealing with it, the judges had to take sides in the philosophical debate over the concept of law. In this context, the prominent voices of the legal philosophers Gustav Radbruch and Hans Kelsen could not go unheard. This paper draws on what could have been the “Radbruch‐Kelsen debate on Nazi Law.” In examining the debate, (...) it will argue for a substantive account of the morality of the law, as expressed in Radbruch's Formula. (shrink)

Negotiation is mainly treated as a process through which counterparts try to satisfy their conflicting interests. This traditional, subjective approach focuses on the interests-based relation between subjects and the resources which are on the bargaining table; negotiation is viewed as a series of joint decisions regarding the relation of each subject to the negotiated resources. In this paper, we will attempt to outline an intersubjective perspective that focuses on the communication-based relation among subjects, a relation that is founded upon communicative (...) rationality mechanisms which are inherent in social activity. Much in contrast to the concept of interests which describe the relationship of each subject alone to the resources, we will use the concept of ?claim-rights? which are properly formed and validated only vis-à-vis negotiating partners and on the basis of the communication that develops among them. We will offer a step-by-step account of the creation of claim-rights and argue that their validation does not necessarily lie in the parties? interests, but in the communication mechanisms that induce consensus and result in mutually acceptable outcomes. (shrink)

This paper deals with the question of how norms are to be conceived of in order to understand their role as guidelines for human action within various normative orders, particularly in the context of law on the one hand and conventional morality on the other. After some brief remarks on the history of the term “norm,” the author outlines the most significant general features of actually existing social norms, including legal and conventional norms, from which he arrives at two basic (...) requirements on an appropriate conception of such norms: the actuality and the normativity requirements. On this basis, he enters into a critical discussion of Kelsen's highly influential view of norms, arguing that this view is doomed to failure. In the last part of the paper, the author scrutinizes the more promising “practice theory of norms” by H.L.A. Hart, which, in his view, also suffers from some shortcomings, but may be modified in a way that leads to a conception of social norms providing us with a plausible explication of their actual existence and their normative force. (shrink)

Метою даної статті стало дослідження принципу Таліону як основного принципу дії єврейського права. Для цього було використано абстрактно-логічні методи, історико-правовий, феноменологічний, аксіологічний, гносеологічний методи, метод критичного та системного аналізу, метод компаративної теології. У результаті дослідження було богословсько охарактеризовано принцип Таліону, виявлено деякі проблемні моменти в цілісному розумінні даного принципу та запропоновано концепцію прямого взаємозв'язку між основними принципами формування і застосування єврейського права в біблійний період. Останнє й взяло на себе функцію наукової новизни цього дослідження, показало максимально тісний взаємозв'язок і кореляцію, (...) що, своєю чергою, дало можливість цілісно поглянути на певні проблеми і задати правильний алгоритм для подальших досліджень названої тематики. (shrink)