According to Luhmann, religion transforms the indefinable/undefined into the definable/defined complexity, thus outlining the problems of the whole society. Due to this function, religion remams bound to the level of the entirety of a social system. Nevertheless, in time, in the course of the functional differentiation of society, different sub-systems have been created for different tasks (economy, science, politics, education, etc.) and religion has been accorded the status of one such system. Besides distinguishing among various subsystems, this process implies the separation of diverse task-areas within the religious system itself. By and by, within the Christian religion, three functionally differentiated spheres have emerged which Luhmann labels as a) the church, i.e. the entirety of spiritual communication in which the function of the system of religion is fulfilled for the whole social system; b) Diaconate (Diakonie), which performs the system's tasks towards other social sub-systems (these tasks, in line with the theory of systems, may be termed services -Leistungen) as well as towards personal systems (in line with the theory of systems they may be termed pastoral - Seelsorge); and c) theology (Theologie) whose role within the religious system may be described as reflexion (Reflexion) i.e. the task of the reflexive contact of one's own identity. (SOI : PM: S. 255)
The author analyses Schmitt's and Luhmann's theory of democracy and the constitutional state. By comparing them, he concludes that Schmitt's critique of the democratic pluralistic state has ended in the theory of direct or plebiscitary democracy in which the constitution is subject to an unpredictable will of political majority which can change it wilfully in line with the power relations. Luhmann, on the other hand, starts from the assumption of the separation between law and politics and builds his concept of the constitutional state on the bipolar differentiation and the mutual checks between law and politics. The author concludes that Luhmann does not give up on Hobbes' pessimistic conviction that human nature is bestial; he only offers a different strategy for the coexistence of cultured savages. (SOI : PM: S. 67)
A few years after the collapse of communist regimes, it is evident that the confidence about the ultimate triumph of liberal democracy was premature. This waking up to the reality is not only the consequence of the hardships in the transformation of post-communist societies, but of the intellectual scepticism regarding the normative potential of liberal democracy in the developed western societies. The problem might in most general terms be formulated as the incapacity of liberal democracy to generate and reproduce the normative requirements for its own survival. The author thinks that the solution to this paradox can nevertheless be found within the institutional framework of liberal democracy: if the traditional moral concepts on which liberal democracy was founded in the past are worn out indeed, and no civil- religious substitute for that tradition has emerged as yet, then its only possibility is to create its own, modern or post-modern, morality by means of the public discourse mechanism and the political participation of citizens. The normative dimension of liberalism must not be reduced to the theory of private ownership, market and competition, but be envisaged as a constitutional theory of human rights and restricted government and the egalitarian distribution of goods and opportunities. (SOI : PM: S. 30)
For many pre-twentieth-century legal and political authors the crucial issue was to find the answers to the questions: Why one cannot support every claim to the right of absolute rule? and, How to curtail power and authority anyway? In this text, the author reviews the contribution of three classics of the modern debate on constitutionalism - C. H. McIlwain, C. J. Friedrich, and F. A. Hayek - whose political/legal theories represent the most glorious pages of the contemporary theory of state and rights and the comparative political systems. (SOI : PM: S. 152)
The collapse of the communist systems has brought about the crisis of identity and the political efficacy of the left not solely in Eastern Europe but in the West as well. Due to this situation, the author claims, all the elements of the traditional leftist identity have come under scrutiny. This applies both to the political ingredients common to all leftist parties (the primacy of economy, rejection of private ownership and market, egalitarianism, collectivism and the theory of progress) as well as the elements which instigated irreconcilable differentiations within the left (internationalism vs. nationalism, parliamentary democracy, the attitude towards violence, reform vs. revolution). The author concludes that due to the complex structure of the problems facing leftist parties and other political protagonists as well, there is little possibility for the emergence of an all-embracing leftist political programme; instead, partial programme variations should be expected. (SOI : PM: S. 21)
The analysis has shown that both approaches are legitimate and useful in understanding and maintaining democracy. Of course, the interactional approaches are more complex, as well as more important and more vital for understanding democracy. The analysis has shown how political culture (democratic legitimation or political trust, support for civil freedoms, satisfaction with the functioning of democracy, etc.) often depend on the elements of the very political structure (party systems and coalition models, election patterns, patterns of democracy, positions in power structure, etc.). Political culture is autonomous in relation to political structure, but frequently its role greatly depends on the relations among political actors and the variables of the political culture itself. The analysis has also demonstrated how these investigations into the interaction (combined effects) between political culture and structure are extremely sophisticated and that in the future they are going to become the most fruitful part of political science, making possible not only a deeper understanding of the "dynamic regularities" in the functioning of democracy but also the attempts at its "innovative sustainment" and gradual development. (SOI : PM: S. 131) + The purpose of this essay is to prove the connection among political culture, political structure and democracy. All the arguments pointing to such a connection have been analysed within the framework of two fundamental approaches to the relationship between culture and structure i.e. within the framework of the classical approach to their correspondence (which claims - primarily in line with the functional theory of culture - that there is a functional concordance between culture and structure, that democracy is mirrored by the civic political culture, i.e. that "culture is a structure's way of life", that culture determines the structure) and the contemporary interactional approach (in which - primarily in line with the theory of culture "as meaning" or "social functioning" - complex relations among various cultural variables and structural variables are analysed as well as their combined effect on democracy as the consequence of these relations). The latter approach considers democracy not as a "fixed condition" but rather as a dynamic phenomenon or the end result of the combined interactional relationships between culture and structure
The article explores Polybius's view from Book Six of Histories in which he argues that the Roman constitution was superior to other mixed systems of government because it evolved naturally. The novelty of Polybius's approach within the wider classical tradition is examined by contrasting his account with Plato's and Aristotle's. The architecture of the two kinds of mixed constitutions is then compared: the Spartan government is taken as a model of a good planned constitution and the Roman constitution as the best naturally evolving system of government. The main be nefit of the natural constitution over all other constitutions, simple and mixed, is its stability, and the final part of the paper addresses a plausible way in which Polybius thought such a constitution was reached in Rome and situates this historical account within his theory of anacyclosis. ; Tekst se bavi Polibijevim razmatranjima iz šeste knjige Istorija, gde helenski autor tvrdi da je rimski ustav bio nadmoćniji u poređenju sa drugim mešovitim porecima zato što se razvijao prirodno. Novina Polibijevog pristupa unutar šire klasične tradicije ispitana je kroz poređenje njegovih ideja sa Platonovim i Aristotelovim. Zatim, upoređena je struktura dveju vrsta mešovitih ustava – spartanski ustav je primer dobrog planiranog ustava, a rimski ustav je najbolji sistem vladanja koji se razvio na prirodan način. Osnovna prednost prirodnog ustava nad ostalim ustavima, bilo da su čistog ili mešovitog oblika, jeste njegova stabilnost, a završni deo teksta bavi se načinima na koje je Rim došao do takvog poretka i postavlja ovo razmatranje u okvire Polibijeve teorije o anaciklozisu.
The Croatian Constitutional Court by its decision of June 24, 1992 partly rejected a reqest to start proceedings, and partly terminated already started proceedings, to determine the constitutionality of some thirty emergency decrees passed by the President of the Croatian Republic during the undeclared war with Serbia and the Yugoslav People's Army in the second half of 1991. The Court backed its decision inter alia by the following arguments: the President has the power to pass emergency decrees without declaring first the state of emergency; presidential emergency decrees can be retroactive since Croatian Constitution does not forbid specifically their retroactivity. The Court's reasoning which endorses a permanent coup d'etat, is very probably a corollary of the idea, which is taken for granted by some Croatian constitutional lawyers, that the Croatian Constitution has been modelled on the Constitution of the French 5th Republic so that the sweeping powers of the French President belong also to his Croatian counterpart. The paper challenges the idea and discusses the relevance of comparative constitutional theory for Croatian constitutional practice. The first three sections demonstrate that, despite political similarities between the early years of the French 5th Republic and the Croatian Republic the two semi-presidential systems differ in several important constitutional and legal respects so that the powers - especially emergency powers - of the French President cannot be used as a persuasive authority to interpret powers of the Croatian President. Section four indicates that if anything in French law is authoritative in interpreting Croatian constitutional provisions on the state of emergency it is the effort of the French Conseil d'etat to control, even though in a very limited way, the legality of presidential emergency decrees. The last section points out that assumptions with which Croatian Constitutional Court interprets presidential powers are more in accord with the Weimar Constitution than with the Constitution of the 5th French Republic. The paper ends with the warning that the unrestrained exercise of presidential powers in Croatia may lead, as it did in Mussolinni's Italy and in the Weimar Republic, to a dictatorship. (SOI : PM: S. 165)
Interesovanje za teoriju i praksu rane intervencije u Srbiji je intenzivirano poslednjih desetak godina. U praksi su odavno zastupljeni različiti oblici rada sa decom sa smetnjama u razvoju ranog uzrasta, dok su teorijsko uobličavanje znanja i sistemski pristup ranoj intervenciji, sagledani kroz donošenje državnih odluka, uključivanje sadržaja iz ove oblasti u studijske programe fakulteta koji školuju defektologa, novijeg datuma. Cilj ovog rada je da ukaže na ključne promene i aktivnosti usmerene na razvoj nacionalnih sistema rane intervencije, s posebnim osvrtom na Srbiju. Od šest priotiteta sadržanih u dokumentu Poziv na akciju: Podrška razvoju dece u ranom detinjstvu koji je Vlada Srbije sačinila u saradnji sa UNICEFOM, a koji je zasnovan na Konvenciji o pravima deteta, Ciljevima održivog razvoja i najboljim interesima za svako dete posebno je značajan prvi podrška roditeljstvu. Izdvajanje ovog prioriteta bazirano je na činjenici da je podrška dobrobiti deteta jedan od najvažnijih ciljeva predškolskog vaspitanja i obrazovanja i da je ostvariv samo onda kada porodica može na adekvatan način da oblikuje sopstvene životne okolnosti. Osim toga takozvani model F-reči, utemeljen na odrednicama Međunarodne klasifikacije funkcionisanja, invalidnosti i zdravlja, vidi porodicu kao centralni "kontekstualni" činilac razvoja, koji ima najbolji potencijal za pružanje fizičke i emocionalne bezbednosti deteta i čija dobrobit treba da bude primarni cilj uključivanja u programe rane intervencije i obezbeđivanja usluga. Iako je rad sa porodicom, ključni činilic pozitivnih ishoda rane intervencije, dosadašnja praksa u ovom segmentu rada može da se opiše kao dugo putovanje od pristupa usmerenog na stručnjake koji donose odluke i sprovodi tretman, do pristupa u čijem fokusu je porodica Veštine uspostavljanja saradničkog odnosa su za stručnjake, koji prihvataju model usmeren na porodicu još uvek velik izazov, jer je neophodno da se uloga donosioca odluka, "prepisivača saveta", zameni ulogom partnera, slušaoca, pomagača i konsultanta. ; Interest in the theory and practice of early intervention in Serbia, has intensified in the last ten years. In practice, various forms of work with children with disabilities at an early age have long been represented, whereas theoretical shaping of knowledge and systematic approach to early intervention seen through state-decision making, inclusion of contents from this area in university programmes for educating defectologist, are of the more recent date. The aim of this paper is to point out the key changes and activities directed to development of national early intervention systems, with special reference to Serbia. Considering the six priorities contained in the document Call to Action: Support to children development in early childhood, created by Government of Serbia in cooperation with UNICEF, based on Convention on the rights of the child, Sustainable development goals and best interest for each child individually, the first one is especially important, parenting support. The selection of this priority is based on the fact that supporting the welfare of the child is one of the most important goals of preschool education and that it is achievable only in case when the family can adquately shape their own life circumstances. Besides, the so-called F-word model based on the International Classification of Functioning Disability and Health, recognizes the family as the central "contextual" factor, with best potential for providing physical and emotional security to the child, whose welfare should be the primary goal of inclusion in early intervention and service providing programmes. Although, the work with family is the key factor in positive outcomes of early intervention, current practice in this segment of work can be described as a long journey from and approach focused on decision-making and treatment professionals, to the family-oriented approach. Collaborative skills are still the great challenge for professionals who accept family-oriented model, as it is necessary to replace the role of decision-maker, "advice transcriber" with the role of partner, listener, assistant and consultant.
