The pure theory of law is a positivist legal theory put forward by Hans Kelsen. Recently there have been two attempts to understand democracy as a source for the normativity that the pure theory assigns to law. Lars Vinx seeks to understand the pure theory as a theory of political legitimacy, in which the normativity that the pure theory assigns to the laws of a state depends on the state’s adoption of certain legitimacy enhancing features, including being democratic. Uta Bindreiter argues that, in the case of European Community law, an additional criterion of democracy must be added to the criteria that the pure theory normally requires of legal systems before the pure theory can presuppose the normativity of European Community law. This thesis will argue that neither of these two accounts succeeds in demonstrating that the normativity of the pure theory can be understood to depend on democracy.

"What is Justice?" is a compilation of essays by Hans Kelsen that deal with problems of justice and their relationship to law, philosophy, and science. The broad scope and applicability of "What is Justice?" makes it a valuable source for research and writing across jurisdictions and in almost any area of law. Access to the English translation of "What is Justice?" is challenging because the book has no index. This present Index aims to provide scholars with a way in to Kelsen's work. Kelsen's tightly packed generalisations and conceptual arguments, which are intended to apply generally to all laws and legal systems, are not accessible to all readers. The Index attempts to present Kelsen's theories in a manner that enables readers to apply them to any area of law and to take full advantage of Kelsen's wisdom. The authors call their work an "index" because it most closely resembles that literary form. However, the work and its companion, "A Diachronic Index and Glossary to [Kelsen's] Pure Theory of Law?" attempt much more. Each has features of a concordance, and each finds conceptual links between Kelsen's insight and legal institutions and reasoning in areas of law that he never considered. A paper that uses the Indexes to examine such links is John Prebble, "Kelsen, the Principle of Exclusion of Contradictions, and General Anti-Avoidance Rules in Tax Law." / Series: WU International Taxation Research Paper Series

Le travail ici présenté offre une approche originelle des notions juridiques développées par Hans Kelsen dans ses efforts vers l'élaboration d'une théorie "pure" du droit. Cette étude est basée sur une analyse philosophique des principaux concepts juridiques qui ont, à leur tour, des caractéristiques philosophiques pertinentes, principalement les notions qui sont apparemment "partagées" entre les domaines juridique et philosophique, sans pour autant garder les mêmes significations sémantiques. La notion la plus pertinente à avoir ces caractéristiques est peut-être celle de "validité", étant donné qu'il s'agit d'une notion présente tant dans le domaine de la logique quant dans le domaine juridique; Dans ce sens, nous prétendons approcher aussi les notions de fiction normative, de science du droit, de conflits entre normes (qui sont aussi erronément appelés "contradictions entre normes"), et la règle d'inférence comme elle est appliquée dans le contexte de la création normative, donnant lieu à des notions trompeuses comme celle de raisonnement pratique. La notion de raisonnement pratique est d'ailleurs très riche concernant ce contexte de comparaison, et elle sera particulièrement traitée en fonction des autres notions problématiques qu'elle génère dans le champ normatif, telles que le Dilemme de Jørgensen; Cette notion, étant employée dans différents cas problématiques du droit, nous offre une opportunité de présenter une approche alternative pour le traitement logique du processus de justification dans la création d'une norme. Nous avons pour objectif aussi d'analyser les notions de condition logique et juridique, qui représentent un changement dans la perspective de Kelsen concernant l'utilité et la légitimité de l'application de la logique dans le champ normatif du droit. Une telle étude comparative, même si elle semble être fondamentale pour éclaircir les notions en question dans ces domaines respectifs, reste une tâche jamais réalisée dans une telle manière systématique. L'objectif de cette étude est de fournit un panorama clair concernant les limites entre les champs de la philosophie (spécialement la logique) et les normes juridiques. La compréhension des relations entre les notions "homonymes" doit aussi expliquer pourquoi elles sont utilisées de forme erronée aussi fréquemment quand les philosophes discutent du droit, mais aussi quand les juristes cherchent des justifications pour les concepts dans leurs théories. Ainsi, le contexte de cette étude est le positivisme juridique tel qu'il est présenté par le philosophe du droit Hans Kelsen. Notre choix est justifié par le fait que lathéorie de Kelsen s'avère l plus conforme à notre approche philosophique d'orientation logique et analytique. L’œuvre qui servira de base à notre investigation est la "Théorie Générale des Normes" (1979), surtout dû au fait de représenter l'intensité des efforts de son auteur pour traiter les problèmes juridiques liés à des aspect philosophiques ou logiques. Cela est particulièrement remarquable dans le cas de la possibilité d'application de la logique aux normes, mais aussi concernant les notions problématiques comme celle de norme fondamentale comme fiction ou encore la notion de substrat indifférent au mode. / The present work offers an original approach on the legal notions developed by Hans Kelsen in his attempts towards a “pure” theory of Law, based on a philosophical analysis of the main legal concepts that have a strong philosophical feature, namely those notions which are somehow “shared” between the two fields in their name, but not always in their meaning. While the most striking notion to be approached via a philosophical perspective would probably be that of legal validity (since validity is a central term also in Logic), we aim, in the same way, to approach the notions of legal fictions, the notion of science in Law, normative conflicts or “contradictions” as they are commonly – and wrongly – named, and the rule of inference as it is applied in the context of normative creation, giving place to the wrong notion of practical reasoning. The notion of practical reasoning is very rich in this context of comparison, and will be a special one, as it serves for us to analyze traditional problems of legal theory, such as Jørgensen’s dilemma, as well as it offers us the opportunity of providing our own alternative of a logical treatment of the process of legal justification of the creation of a norm. We aim to analyze the notion of legal and logical conditions as well, which represent a changing in Kelsen’s perspective on the utility and legitimacy of the application of logic to the legal domain. Such a comparative study, even if it appears to be fundamental for clarifying those notions in their respective fields, is a task never before developed in this systematic manner. The objective of such a study is to provide a clear overview of the boundaries between the fields of philosophy (especially logic) and the legal norms. A clear understanding of the relations between those “homonym” notions may explain why they are most of the time misused when philosophers talk about law, as well as when lawyers try to justify the concepts composing the legal theory.The context of this study is the legal positivism as it is explained by the legal-philosopher Hans Kelsen. This choice is justified by the fact that Kelsen’s legal theory appears to be the most suitable frame for an analytical, logic-oriented investigation. The work emphasized will be the General Theory of Norms (1979), mainly because of the fact that this book represents how intensively Kelsen dedicated himself to the legal problems mostly related to philosophy or logic, namely the question of the application of logic to norms and the clarification of problematic notions such as the basic norm as a fiction or, still, the notion of modally indifferent substrate.

[pt] A presente dissertação pretende contrapor o direito natural de John Finnis ao positivismo jurídico de Hans Kelsen, mais precisamente quanto às considerações desses autores em torno da discussão sobre a Justiça, conforme as razões defendidas pelas duas teorias. O foco de nossa abordagem, desse modo, se volta ao positivismo conceitual de Kelsen, ligado às fontes do Direito, onde é inadmitido valorar a proposição normativa como justa ou injusta, bem como ao neojusnaturalismo de Finnis, que desenvolve uma metodologia densa em torno da moral para demonstrar que o Positivismo Jurídico só poderá ser apto a realizar uma lúcida descrição do Direito, caso se sirva dos dogmas previstos em sua teoria. Como consequência dessa incursão, nosso objetivo também será o de demonstrar que a realidade jurídica impõe a inegável constatação de que ambas as vertentes do direito se aproximam em vários pontos, podendo-se em alguns momentos sustentar que a alegada dicotomia está de fato rompida. / [en] This dissertation aims to counteract the natural right of Jonh Finnis with legal positivism of Hans Kelsen, more precisely as the considerations of these authors concerning the discussion about justice, as the reasons put forward by the two theories. The focus of our approach thus turns to the conceptual positivism of Kelsen, connected to the sources of law, where it is not admitted appraising the normative proposition as just or unjust, as well as the neojusnaturalismo of Finnis, who develops a methodology dense around of morality, to show that legal positivism only be able to perform a lucid description of the law, if it serves the tenets laid down in his theory. As a result of this incursion, our goal is also to demonstrate that legal reality requires the undeniable fact that both strands of the right approach at various points, and you may at times claim that the alleged dichotomy is indeed broken.

[pt] A presente dissertação diz respeito a um dos temas centrais da Teoria do Direito: o conceito de sanção. Muitos dos conceitos jurídicos básicos - inclusive o próprio conceito de Direito - encontram-se estritamente conectados com ele, de forma que um estudo cuidadoso sobre esse tema possibilitará que muitas outras questões fundamentais do Direito sejam, senão resolvidas, ao menos aclaradas. As inúmeras subdivisões que a complexidade do tema acarreta tornaram necessárias delimitações quanto ao objeto de estudo. Portanto, dentro da ampla esfera interessante ao pesquisador empenhado em deslindar o tema, optou-se por centrar a pesquisa em objetivos mais modestos: o de reconhecer e apresentar os principais problemas que encerram o conceito de sanção para a teoria do direito em três autores específicos - Jeremy Bentham, John Austin e Hans Kelsen - pertencentes a uma mesma tradição de pensamento jurídico, a Teoria Analítica do Direito (analytical jurisprudence). Tal escolha é facilmente justificável, em virtude da centralidade do conceito em suas concepções de Direito. / [en] The present work refers to one of the central subjects of the Legal Theory: the concept of sanction. Many of the basic legal concepts - and the concept of Law itself - are strictly connected with it, in such a way that a careful study on this subject will make possible that many other basic questions of the Law are, if not solved, at least clarified. Because of the innumerable subdivisions caused by that the complexity of the subject, it had become necessary to delimitate the studied object. Therefore, within the wide area of interest presented by the subject, the researcher has opted to focus his/her work on more modest objectives: to recognize and to present the main problems concerning the concept of sanction inside the work of three specific authors - Jeremy Bentham, John Austin and Hans Kelsen -, being them all part of the same legal thought tradition, the analytical school of jurisprudence. Such choice is justified by the unquestionable importance that the authors confer to the sanctions in their legal theories.

Cette thèse se donne pour objectif de mesurer la portée actuelle des principales conceptualisations de Hans Kelsen dans la doctrine et le droit positif international. Pour ce faire, cette étude envisage une reconstruction de la pensée du juriste viennois dans la discipline spécifique de droit international placée à la lumière du contexte de l'évolution normative, institutionnelle et politique de l'ordre juridique international. L'ambition est ainsi de faire ressortir l'originalité de son approche du phénomène international et sa portée actuelle. Il s'agira aussi d'en mesurer les limites et les possibilités de dépassement. / His thesis has the objective of measuring the current scope of the main conceptualizations of Hans Kelsen in the doctrine of international law and international positive law. The study envisages a reconstruction of the thought of the Viennese lawyer in international law placed in the light of the context of the evolving normative, institutional and politic of the international legal order. This is the gift of bringing out the originality of his thought, to measure the presence of the positivist approach in debate of the unity of international law.

[pt] A Teoria Pura do Direito despontou na primeira metade do século XX como uma vigorosa crítica à teoria jurídica tradicional. A posição que contra esta dirigiu consiste em um impressionante empreendimento epistemológico, articulado de modo a afastar do estudo do Direito elementos políticos e métodos com outras ciências compartilhados. Seu autor, Hans Kelsen, pretendia dotar o jurista de um aparato teórico que lhe permitisse contemplar seu objeto de estudo com a mesma qualidade e exatidão já alcançada por quem das ciências naturais se ocupava. Para tanto, ele considerava necessário que o saber jurídico fosse alçado à categoria de saber científico autônomo, o que buscou realizar com o desenvolvimento da sua célebre doutrina. Não obstante o inconteste avanço que representou, a Teoria Pura do Direito parece conter em seu discurso um problema insolúvel que compromete sua integral sustentabilidade. Trata-se da Cláusula Alternativa Tácita, tese kelseniana versada aqui, cujo delineamento é antecedido pela investigação das premissas e conceitos fundamentais à sua compreensão. / [en] The Pure Theory of Law emerged in the first half of the 20th century as a vigorous criticism to the traditional juridical theory. This opposition consists in an impressive epistemological program, whose main target is to eliminate from the study of Law both political elements and specific methods shared with other sciences. Its author, Hans Kelsen, intended to provide a theoretical apparatus to the jurist which would allow him to contemplate his object with the same qualty and accuracy already attained in the natural sciences. In order to do so, he found necessary the juridical knowledge had both scientificity and autonomy, and his famous doctrine was conceived to achieve that. Nevertheless, in spite of the undeniable progress that came with it, the Pure Theory of Law seems to suffer from an insoluble problem that might compromise its integral sustainability. It is the Tacit Alternative Clause, Kelsenian thesis of which we shall treat here and whose delineation is preceded by the investigation of the premises and concepts which are crucial to its full understanding.

No description available.

Univ., Diss.--Kiel, 1996.

Le droit de la recherche, entendu en tant que discipline juridique, concerne la régulation de la recherche scientifique entre les impératifs opposés de la science et du droit. Il est donc question, à travers cette construction juridique de l'objet « science » par le « droit de la recherche », de comprendre les modes d'émergence et les fonctions - l'élaboration et la régulation - d'un tel droit à la fois gardien et contradicteur des institutions savantes. L'intérêt et l'utilité du droit de la recherche pourrait bien être de montrer, à travers une analyse juridique des comportements scientifiques, comment fonctionne le droit entendu en tant que technique. Est-ce que la théorie juridique peut saisir un objet sociologique ? Pour répondre, le concept de « communauté scientifique », bien connue en sociologie des sciences (voir notamment Robert K. Merton et la « structure normative » de la science), va être analysée suivant la théorie de l'ordre juridique du constitutionnaliste italien Santi Romano, afin de mieux comprendre la définition du concept d'ordre juridique. Finalement, il apparaît que la régulation opérée par l'ordre juridique étatique contrarie l'indépendance de la science, notamment la sphère universitaire, et ne parvient pas toujours à en assurer la protection là où l'État devrait justement sauvegarder et promouvoir la quête de savoir. Serait-il possible, dès lors, de consacrer une science libérée de son hétéronomie par rapport à l'Etat ? C'est toute la proposition finale de la création d'un statut juridique authentique pour le chercheur et, notamment, de la résolution des conflits scientifiques par des Cours scientifiques de nature prud'homale / Understood as a legal discipline, the right of research, relates to the regulation of scientific research between the opposite requirements of science and law. So we're talking through this legal construction of the object : "science", through the "law of research" to understand the patterns of emergence and functions - the development and regulation - of such a right being both caretaker and opponent to the learned institutions.The value and usefulness of the right of the research might be to show, through a legal analysis of scientific behavior, how does the right being understood as a technique works. Does the legal theory can understand a sociological object ? To answer to this, the concept of "scientific community", well known in sociology of science (see especially Robert K. Merton and the "normative structure" of science), will be analyzed according to the theory of the legal system of the Italian constitutional lawyer Santi Romano, in order to better understand the definition of the concept of the legal order.Eventually, it appears that the regulation operated by the state legal order upsets the independence of science, especially the academia sphere and is not always being able to ensure protection where the state should precisely safeguard and promote the quest for knowing. Is it therefore possible to devote a science released from his heteronomy versus the state ? This is the whole final proposal for the establishment of an authentic legal status for the Researcher and, especially, the resolution of scientific disputes by some sort of scientific Labour Court lessons