The Twilight of European Philosophy of Law
Izvleček
The question about the European values is the question about the differentia specifica of our legal self-understanding. These values, for example, can best be recognized at the geographical borders, where a set of specific values tends to get more obvious. This way, however, it is only the more general western values that become transparent. The thesis of this paper is that the differentia specifica of European legal self-understanding can be described only in its distinction from the American legal identity. The dif-ferentiating issue here is the metaphysics of 19th and 20th centu-ries, which has had its foremost influence only in the European cultural environment, and introduces the project of constructing an entirely new world and destroying the existing one. Even the traumatic experience of various totalitarianisms has not spelt the end to the fixation on utopian ideals. Its destructive effects can be recognized at three levels:1) The sentiment of mistrust affects the judiciary, in that the respect for jurisdiction is low; judges are stripped of authority, and expected to be just viva vox legis. 2) The sentiment of waiting is typical for legislative; the appearance of “just, equal, far” etc. world is still to come; which in turn neces-sities a voting system that allows for as many “ideas” as possible (i.e. parties) are allowed to get into the parliament. And finally 3) the sentiment of guilt affects the executive power. It is reflected in the destruction of the penal system which consequently becomes progressively more ineffective.
References
Rutledge & Kegan Paul, Boston, 1981.
Foucault, M., »Society Must Be Defended, Picador, New York, 1997.
Huntington, H., The Clash of Civilization?, Foreign affairs, Vol. 73, No. 3., 1993.
Locke, J., Two Trities of Gowerment, Baldwin, London, 1824.
Marx, K., Engels, F.; The Communist Manifesto, Global Grey, 2014.
Rousseau, J.J., Discourse on the Origin of Inequality, in Rousseau, The Social Contracts and Discourses,
London J. M. Dent, 1982.
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.
Authors who publish with this journal agree to the following terms:
- Authors are confirming that they are the authors of the submitting article, which will be published (print and online) in journal Dignitas by Nova univerza, Fakulteta za slovenske in mednarodne študije. Author’s name will be evident in the article in journal. All decisions regarding layout and distribution of the work are in hands of the publisher.
- Authors guarantee that the work is their own original creation and does not infringe any statutory or common-law copyright or any proprietary right of any third party. In case of claims by third parties, authors commit their self to defend the interests of the publisher, and shall cover any potential costs.
- Authors retain copyright and grant the journal right of first publication with the work simultaneously licensed under a
Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0)
that allows others to share the work with an acknowledgement of the work's authorship and initial publication in this journal. - Authors are able to enter into separate, additional contractual arrangements for the non-exclusive distribution of the journal's published version of the work (e.g., post it to an institutional repository or publish it in a book), with an acknowledgement of its initial publication in this journal.
- Authors are permitted and encouraged to post their work online (e.g., in institutional repositories or on their website) prior to and during the submission process, as it can lead to productive exchanges, as well as earlier and greater citation of published work.
