Mgr Damian Kazimierski
University of Warsaw
English abstract: The Polish constitutional model is founded on the principle of sovereign power vested in the Nation, as expressed in Article 4 of the Constitution of the Republic of Poland. However, such an unequivocal designation of the sovereign proves problematic in practice and has been subject to criticism by a significant portion of legal scholarship. The aim of this article is to propose a revision of the Polish concept of sovereignty of the Nation, said revision based on the philosophy of labour developed by Stanisław Brzozowski. Through an analysis of Brzozowski’s philosophical writings, the article puts forward ways of incorporating the core value of his thought – human labour – into the system of government. A test for legal regulations is proposed, enabling an assessment of these legal regulations in terms of their relationship to the sovereign as understood through the lens of the philosophy of labour, that is, their relationship to the producer or the worker. The sovereign is one whose life does not depend on natural conditions, who is capable of imposing their will upon the world – i.e. the producer. In Brzozowski’s writings, this category is defined in an exceptionally broad manner, setting it apart from the notion of the worker in Marxist theory. This broader definition allows for the inclusion of the self-employed, public-sector employees, and individuals employed in roles not directly linked to production, thus significantly expanding the group of those who may be considered as wielding sovereign power, according to the framework developed based on Brzozowski’s essays. The article offers an original interpretation of Brzozowski’s philosophy of labour, proposing its application in political science and legal theory – fields which have previously been rarely discussed in the context of this philosophy.
Key words: Stanislaw Brzozowski (1878–1911), philosophy of labour, principle of national sovereignty, sovereign
Language: polish
Published: Number 2(47)/2026, pp. 41–58.
DOI: https://doi.org/10.36280/AFPiFS.2026.2.41
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