Those who declare allegiance to the banner of legal realism might just as easily be called sceptics (and they sometimes are) or even cynics. Indeed, many students—especially after their gruelling journey through legal positivism—find that they are in good company. The realists, they are relieved to discover, eschew the ponderous metaphysics which they discern in...Read More

Imagine a powerful sovereign who issues commands to his subjects. They are under a duty to comply with his wishes. The notion of law as a command lies at the heart of classical legal positivism as espoused by its two great protagonists, Jeremy Bentham and John Austin. Modern legal positivists adopt a considerably more sophisticated...Read More

Cicero (born 106 BC and died 43 BC) was a famous Roman lawyer, speaker, statesman, constitutionalist, and political philosopher. He wrote a famous book on law called De Legibus (which means roughly “On the Laws). In that book, he wrote a lot about what he thought law is and what he thought natural law is....Read More

Having now come to the end of our brief and very incomplete review of the problems of philosophy, it will be well to consider, in conclusion, what is the value of philosophy and why it ought to be studied. It is the more necessary to consider this question, in view of the fact that many...Read More

Article 1 [Human dignity – Human rights – Legally binding force of basic rights] (1) Human dignity shall be inviolable. To respect and protect it shall be the duty of all state authority. (2) The German people therefore acknowledge inviolable and inalienable human rights as the basis of every community, of peace and of justice...Read More

A discussion of the constitutional system of the Netherlands requires a preliminary definition of what exactly is meant by ‘the Netherlands’. In its popular use, the Netherlands is a state in Western Europe, north of Belgium, west of Germany, along the coast of the North Sea. Its present-day constitution dates back to 1814/1815, when after...Read More

The first modern political entity that emerged in the territory roughly corresponding to the present-day Netherlands was the United Provinces created by the Union of Utrecht in 1579. Via the Union, which was a treaty primarily on military cooperation, the seven northerly provinces of the lowlands – Friesland, Groningen, Holland, Utrecht, Overijssel, Zeeland and the...Read More

Many of the theories outlined in the previous five chapters are greeted with scepticism by those who adhere to what, in the broadest sense, may be called critical legal theory. This wing of legal theory generally spurns many of the enterprises that have long been assumed to be at the heart of jurisprudence. And it...Read More

Formally, the Constitution in force today is still the Grondwet for the Kingdom of the Netherlands of 1815. In practice, however, the document is often referred to as the ‘Constitution of 1848’ or as the ‘Constitution of 1983’. These two years saw constitutional amendments so far-reaching that they effectively produced new constitutional texts. The 1848...Read More

For over a century, English and French lawyers have compared their respective laws of contract. But the purpose of such comparisons has never been agreed. A recent volume of essays by both English and French authors, Contract Law Today: Anglo-French Comparisons, edited by Donald Harris and Denis Tallon, prompts these reflections upon the methods and...Read More