law

Andrey Zvyagintsev’s ‘Leviathan’: The Unbearable State of Nature

Mgr Katarzyna Krzyżanowska

European University Institute, Florence

Abstract: Leviathan by Andrey Zvyagintsev is a movie that depicts the world in a state of nature, with no prospects for creating a Hobbesian social contract. Set in the Russian peripheries, the film depicts a respected and caring family man who is gradually deprived of everything because of lack of political order with enforceable law and justice. The movie is a depiction of a contemporary “failed state”, equalized with the state of nature, where there is no legitimate power and violence remains the only tool to achieve goals both in private and public spheres. Religion consists of empty rituals that serve corrupt officials to maintain power. This world cannot last without innocent victims, scapegoats of the society, one of whom is the protagonist of the movie. This paper offers a legal and philosophical inquiry into the film, as it draws especially on the theory of the social contract proposed by Hobbes. It depicts a Russian town as a symbol of the state of nature as envisioned by Hobbes and describes the reasons why the social contract has not been made. According to Hobbes’s theory, in the state of nature concepts like justice and injustice do not convey any meaning; therefore, this paper investigates other: theological and anthropological concepts, to explore the meaning of Zvyagintsev’s Leviathan.

Keywords: Leviathan, Hobbes, Legendre, Agamben, crisis, ritual, religion, law

Language: English

Published: Number 1(26)/2021, s. 62-75.

DOI: https://doi.org/10.36280/AFPiFS.2021.1.62

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Between Justice and Mercy: Comparison of American and Russian Versions of 12 Angry Men

Dr Paweł Jabłoński

University of Wrocław

Abstract: The aim of the article is to thematize two different types of attitudes to the law – which, referring to works by Marek Jan Siemek and Lon Luvois Fuller, I call the “Eastern attitude” and the “Western attitude”. This task is realized by a comparative interpretation of two famous films: 12 Angry Men, directed by Sidney Lumet, and Nikita Mikhalkov’s Russian-language remake of Lumet’s movie, titled 12. I try to show that although these two films tell similar stories, there are significant differences between them in regard to the perception of the law. In the American version, the law is a system of mechanisms that really work and are taken seriously. In the Russian version, the law is, to a large extent, only an appearance, which in reality must be replaced by ethics.

Keywords: law, respect for law, ethics, “West”, “East”, justice, mercy

Language: Polish

Published: Number 1(26)/2021, s. 45-61.

DOI: https://doi.org/10.36280/AFPiFS.2021.1.45

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On Beauty in a Lawyer’s Work

Dr Tomasz Barszcz

John Paul II Catholic University of Lublin

English abstract: The article concerns the relationship between beauty and a lawyer’s professional work. I attempt to: 1) discover and describe the activities that are particular of such work as well as are determined by beauty; 2) characterize the way in which beauty determines these activates; and 3) point out ontological reasons of this determination. The reflections do not, however, include all activities which the lawyer’s craft consists in, but are limited to those in the course of which decisions are made. Beauty determines a lawyer’s work via the process of decision-making; and if a decision is conceived as an act of cooperation between intellect and will, then the decision is related to beauty in three ways. First of all, beauty constitutes a sine qua non for finding out the circumstances in which the decision is made. Additionally, beauty suggests to the decision-maker the options as the optimal means to an end. Finally, beauty influences the approval of a decision already made.

Keywords: beauty, law, decision-making, intellect, will

Language: Polish

Published: Number 4(25)/2020, pp. 17-28.

DOI: https://doi.org/10.36280/AFPiFS.2020.4.17

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Number of downloads: 59

A Few Questions Concerning Photographs in Court Decisions

Dr Michał Dudek

Jagiellonian University in Kraków

Abstract: The aim of this article is to discuss the infrequent, but noticeable, practice of inserting photographs in court decisions. Against the background of the few existing studies on this practice, which seem to be overly case-specific, this article proposes a more general, even universal list of problems connected with it. It addresses a short list of questions about the inclusion of photographs in court decisions, such as, for instance: “Why do judges include in court decisions photographs concerning the case-relevant facts?”; “Who are the addressees of these photographs?”; “What is the source of the photographs used and are all sources allowable?”; and “How come that some segments of court decisions are accompanied by relevant photographs and others are not?”. A discussion of these and other questions enables the conceptualisation of many problems connected with inserting photographs in court decisions – most notably, that of the criteria of choice, which previously has not been explicitly addressed, but barely hinted at – and leads to the conclusion that the practice in question, surrounded by many controversies, should be discontinued.

Keywords: law, visuality, court decisions, photographs

Language: English

Received: 19.01.2017
Accepted: 29.09.2017

Published: Number 2(17)/2018, pp. 60-74.

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Number of downloads: 75