Suchergebnisse

The author initiates the article with the theory that the concept of sovereignty significantly differs in the late Middle Ages & the early modern age. Bodin gave to the sovereign the competency to both legislate & command, thus creating a significant shift forward from the medieval monarchical competency. Although he connected the two competencies, he was still unable to make the sovereign master of law but only master of statutes, with some limitations. The modern age recognizes two types of sovereignty: sovereignty of the sovereign & sovereignty of the people. The first case deals with absolute monarchies, while the second is concerned with democracies. Today, only the latter case is politically relevant. The author differentiates between 'the people' as a group of autonomous individuals, & 'the people' as an organic entity. The first form of political unity comes from autonomous individuals, & sees in the government only limiting power, while the second sees the basis for political unity in the whole of the ethnic body, culture, language, religion, history, etc. The second form has its roots in the romanticism of the 19th century; since the fall of socialist systems, it is again dominant in political thought & practice. The author warns of the dangers of one-sided use of organic unity in the creation of political communities & considers a combination of national & individual elements (democratic & liberal) the only successful basis for sovereignty. Adapted from the source document.

The author distinguishes between the antiquity's & Middle Ages' teachings on natural law & justice as a virtue & the modern-age Hobbes' theory of the prerequisites of the legal system. Hobbes' theory identifies the prerequisites of the legal system & describes the institution of legal constraint which guarantees the rule of law. The author points to the central historical difference between these paradigms. Finally, the author traces the evolution of Hobbes' paradigm in Kant's philosophy of right. Adapted from the source document.

The authors of this text consider the third form of representation developed in the medieval doctrine of corporation, the so-called identity or pars pro toto representation. It concerns a relationship in which a part of the corporation -- council, assembly, or some members -- is considered identical to the whole body of the corporation in terms of its activity. The main purpose of identity representation is to mediate the idea of legal unity of corporation with the multitude of its members or parts of which it consists: by the act of representation different parts of the corporation form its legal unity at the moment of reaching decisions. Unlike in agency representation, the position of the representative is thus not the consequence of authorisation or of the transfer of power of action by those represented: the representative and the represented are not two separate legal entities; rather, it is considered that with the action of its "elevated" part, the corporation acts by itself. The text presents three fundamental subtypes of identity representation: Marsilius of Padua's valentior pars, rendering majority decisions on issues concerning the corporation as a whole, and a permanent representative body. Special attention is given to the Conciliar Movement in which identity representation played an important part, and to the first association of representation through identity with the idea of authorisation in the thought of Nicholas of Cues. The text looks into estate assemblies of German Lander (provinces) in the period prior to the French Revolution as an example of historic institutionalisation of identity representation. Adapted from the source document.