Obstacles to a World Legal Order and Their Removal

T HE present need for a world legal order is obvious. In an atomicage the settlement of international disputes by resort to forcerather than by recourse to law is so likely, if not absolutely certain,to mean the end of civilization that it involves a risk which no wiseman, if he can avoid it, will take.One may well ask why in the face of this fact, evident to all, recentattempts at a legal world order have failed to achieve their goal. Certainlythe time has come when the cause of this failure must be determinedand if possible removed

Philosophical Issues in Contemporary Law

PHILOSOPHY is the name for the basic methodological and theoretical assumptionsof a subject. Since every science uses some method of investigationand any scientist who reports facts to his colleagues must express these factsin words and, hence, introduce concepts and theory, it follows that anyscience whatever is also a philosophy. When no facts arise, however, tobring the traditional theory or methods of a subject into question, its problemsare not philosophical. Then to be a scientist one need not also be a philosopher.Mathematics and physics were in such a state during the two hundred yearsfollowing the publication of Newton\u27s Principia in 1686. American lawthought it was in a similar condition when, following Langdell, it introducedthe case method and identified its science with the empirical study of cases.But whenever facts arise in any subject which bring its traditional theory ormethods into question, at that moment its problems become philosophical.Then to be an effective scientist one must also be a philosopher. Such hasbeen the state of mathematics and physics since the end of the nineteenthcentury. Such, as this essay indicates, is the state of law at the present time

International Conflict and Means of Resolution

Although the topic, upon which I have been asked to speak, may seem especially academic, in view of the present state of the world, it none the less has important implications for you as mili­tary men

Law, Language and Morals

THERE is an essential connection between law, language and morals. It becomesevident when one notes what law and morals have in common and considersthe language of specific moral and legal theories.Both law and morals are normative subjects. They deal with value termsas well as with language that refer to some nonnormatively described is. Inlaw, the is appears as the facts of the case, whereas the normative factorexhibits itself in such words as innocent, guilty, delict, right, liability, obligation and murder. In personal morality, religion, art and literature realism purports merely to exhibit or describe what is, but with atension of conscience that combines the ought and the is, adding evaluativeterms such as good, bad, sin, virtue, ought, beautiful, ugly, selfish, self-sacrificingly God-committed or aesthetically sensitive or insensitive

Naturalistic and Cultural Foundations for a More Effective International Law

INTERNATIONAL like domestic law must face the difficult question ofnorms. Without common norms between the nations and the cultures ofthe world there can be no effective international law. How are such universalnorms for an effective international law to be found ?Contemporary developments in the social sciences and in the philosophyof natural science indicate that there are two sources. One is in the normscommon to the diverse cultures of the world. The other is in scientificallyverified philosophy of nature. The former source happens to be intimatelyconnected with the latter

Petrazycki\u27s Psychological Jurisprudence: Its Originality and Importance

Professor Babb\u27s abridgment into one volume and his English translation of Petraiycki\u27s mature legal works and Professor Tima- sheff\u27s concise Introduction give the essentials of the context and con- tent of Petraiycki\u27s legal science.\u27 The context is important for un- derstanding the theory. The contents demonstrate Petraiycki\u27s originality and establish him as a legal thinker of first rate importanc

Comparative Philosophy of Comparative Law

Cultural anthropology and sociological jurisprudence have shown thatthere is no culture or society without normative legal procedures forsettling the disputes of its people. Moreover, these legal proceduresvary in their normative ethical content. So different is this content fromculture to culture that the anthropologist Professor E. A. Hoebel hasfound it necessary to introduce seven normatively different sets of postulatesin order to describe the legal norms of seven so-called primitivepeoples. Such facts remind us that in comparative law and philosophyit is very dangerous to use the words good or just unless we specifyboth the culture to which we are referring and its specific set of normativeassumptions