The issue includes following papers:

• mgr Szymon Mazurkiewicz, Legal Positivism Social Source Thesis and Metaphysical Grounding: Employing Metaphysical Grounding based on Metaphysical Laws,
• dr Marcin Pieniążek, Dimensions of Legal Ethics in the Light of Paul Ricoeur’s ‘Petite Éthique’,
• prof. dr hab. Marek Smolak, The Culture of Justification and Public Reason: Comments on the Motion of Members of the Polish Parliament to the Constitutional Tribunal,
• prof. UŁ dr hab. Tomasz Tulejski, Paulus Vladimiri and His Forgotten Concept of the Just War,
• prof. UG dr hab. Tomasz Widłak, Judges’ Virtues and Vices: Outline of a Research Agenda for Legal Theory,
• prof. dr hab. Wojciech Załuski, Why Moral Norms Cannot be Reduced to Facts: On a Trilemma in Derivations of Moral “Ought” from “Is”,
• mgr Tomasz Zyglewicz, Against the Input View of Legal Gaps.

The issue also features a review of Dr Henry Hardy’s (University of Oxford) book “In Search of Isaiah Berlin: A Literary Adventure”, written by prof. dr hab. Beata Polanowska-Sygulska (Jagiellonian University in Kraków) and a polemical reply by the author.

The issue can be read here.

ICI Journals Master List is an international indexing database of scientific journals, and the Index Copernicus Value is an evaluation standard for scientific journals, indicating, inter alia, the rate at which the journal increases the quotability of published articles.

University of Warsaw

Language: English

Published: Number 1(10)/2015, pp. 110-116

DOI: https://doi.org/10.36280/AFPiFS.2015.1.110

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Number of downloads: 487

Adam Mickiewicz University in Poznań

English abstract: The paper analyses the nature of moral reasoning when balancing constitutional rights. The fundamental assumption is the idea that adequate moral reasoning based on the Weight Formula should demonstrate the reasons for adopting specific principles. This demonstration should be rational. Rationality can be achieved by applying J. Rawls’s methods of reflective equilibrium. The above method consists of background theory/approach. I propose to consider two background theories/approaches, namely Dworkin’s idea of integrity and the concept of the rule of law formulated by O. Raban. My aim is to argue that the latter is more accurate for moral reasoning when balancing constitutional rights than the former because it helps us to rationalize the broadly understood process of taking judicial decisions.

Keywords: Weight Formula, reflective equilibrium, moral reasoning, Ofer Raban

Language: English

Published: Number 1(10)/2015, pp. 89-96

DOI: https://doi.org/10.36280/AFPiFS.2015.1.89

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Number of downloads: 687

University of Gdańsk

English abstract: Our article concentrates on emotions as related to the functioning of man in the judicial system seen as a modern bureaucratic institution. Special attention is given to the work of judges due to their key position in this system. In legal discourse there is a dominating normative idea of a judge as a decision-making subject free of any emotional factors influencing their judgment. According to this traditional approach, a decision biased even in the slightest way by emotions could not be regarded as impartial, whereas judicial impartiality is regarded as one of the core values of the justice system. Our standpoint assumes not only that judges experience emotions but also asserts that they are being manifested in varied ways. Our analysis is based on Arlie Hochschild’s conception of emotional labour. Such labour is being performed when an individual reflects on his or her feelings and makes an effort either to change or to inhibit emotions which are regarded as misfitting. The necessity of emotional work is a result of cultural feeling and expression rules. It seems prima facie that there is one clear expression rule regarding displaying emotions by the judge in the Polish legal culture: no emotions allowed. However, contrary to possible reconstructed declarations and recommendations warning judges against showing emotions, the rules of expressing them in Polish courts are not unequivocal. We claim that one can distinguish between unconditional and conditional rules of expressing emotions. The former relate to expressing emotions concerning non-professional participants, and conditional rules of expressing emotions relate to professional participants in the hearing. There are situations in which an emotional reaction is reasonable, because it represents certain values to which the justice department adheres, and those in which judges regret showing annoyance or anger. The goal of the emotional labour performed is not only a realization of the value of impartiality, but also the balance of the judges that allows them to efficiently fulfil their role.

Keywords: Arlie Hochschild, legal culture, judicial impartiality

Language: English

Published: Number 1(10)/2015, pp. 97-109

DOI: https://doi.org/10.36280/AFPiFS.2015.1.97

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Number of downloads: 654

Andrzej Frycz Modrzewski Krakow University

English abstract: The paradigm of legal positivism, historically the most important attempt at turning law into science, has been subject to thorough criticism in past decades. The criticism has concerned the most important features of legal positivism, and especially the assumption of separation of law and morality, the dogma of statue being the only source of law, and the linguistic methods of interpreting legal texts. With a crisis of the positive paradigms, the demand for new, humanistic grounds for analysing philosophical and legal questions is intensifying. This is the reason for this article’s attempt to point to the application of Paul Ricoeur’s achievements to the key questions of the philosophy of law. It must be emphasised that his works, and especially Soimême comme un autre, may serve as a foundation for a philosophy of law rejecting the problematic claims about the dualism of being and obligation, the distinction of descriptive and prescriptive languages, and also the separation of law and morality. Thanks to this, the legal topos pacta sunt servanda (agreements must be kept) finds a reinforcement in the ontology of the subject applying law and can be understood as an ethically significant pattern of identity of the self. Equally fruitful seems the possibility of combining the questions of the ontology of the subject applying law with the question of a legal text and its interpretation. The assumption of Ricoeur’s perspective leads to a reduction in the distance between the legal text and its addressee, emphasised by the critics of legal positivism. This rapprochement becomes possible thanks to the connection of the question of the narrative that a legal text is with the question of narrativisation of the subject (i.e. the interpreter of a legal text), being itself in the ipse sense, i.e. applying the law.

Keywords: Paul Ricoeur, legal positivism, legal interpretation

Language: English

Published: Number 1(10)/2015, pp. 79-88

DOI: https://doi.org/10.36280/AFPiFS.2015.1.79

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Number of downloads: 517

English abstract: In the article “Carl Schmitt Revisited by the United States and the Terrorist” it is shown that Carl Schmitt’s morals, standards and views can be noticed in the United States policy in the context of so-called “war on terror”. According to the article, Islamic terrorists are a mirror image of Schmittan revolutionary partisan. It is discussed how terrorists are, as a problem, treated by the USA, which in author’s opinion displays many Schmittan features. Schmitt is one of the few who claim that the sovereign state is above the legal order and can set boundaries. It is therefore shown that the USA seem to have rushed into Schmittan “state of exception”, where norms are suspended in order to achieve security, resembling the thinking of the G.W. Bush administration. It is illustrated how the USA seem to be following Schmitt’s ideology, especially by making exceptions to international rules, but also putting the terrorist outside of the scope of international regulations. Lastly, author tries to answer the question if it is justified to follow Schmitt and obey to the rule of law.

Keywords: Carl Schmitt, war on terror, state of exception

Language: English

Published: Number 1(10)/2015, pp. 69-78

DOI: https://doi.org/10.36280/AFPiFS.2015.1.69

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Number of downloads: 493

University of Łódź

English abstract: The article presents selected problems relevant for the contentious issue of abortion and the related discourses indicating that one of the characteristic features of abortion discourse is its mediatization. The author aims to characterize the constraints on abortion discourses and the varied environments in which the different types of such discourses emerge. Abortion discourses are sociolinguistically diverse and may exhibit different styles and modes of expression. Although they share the scope of the subject matter involved as in all cases they are centred on abortion-related problems, the field of discourse in each case is defined by the nature of the communicative situation in which a particular discourse is embedded. All abortion discourses are underlined by particular assumptions concerning the nature of human life and its beginning, as well as the issues of the dignity and liberty of the human person. The author suggests that what really hampers abortion discourses and prevents their participants from reaching a consensus is the fact that people who engage in such disputes are faced with the incommensurability of the values which translate into decisive factors and the final arguments used by interacting discussants. Another problem is posed by the fact that the two extreme positions in the debate are formulated with the use of different styles and registers, which results in the clash of asymmetric discourses. Finally, it is not insignificant that subjectively important values are much varied and that they must coexist with two main sets or “families” of abortion-oriented fundamental values present in the polarised camps.

Keywords: abortion discourse, dignity, liberty, human person

Language: English

Published: Number 1(10)/2015, pp. 53-68

DOI: https://doi.org/10.36280/AFPiFS.2015.1.53

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Number of downloads: 484

Jagiellonian University

English abstract: The main aim of the author is to analyze the term “moral intuitions”, used in discussions pertaining to moral luck. He presents the contemporary psychological estimation of moral intuitions based on the research of Jonathan Haidt (Social Intuitionist Model) and philosophical moral intuitionism. He claims that these two approaches do not have one subject of interest; hence, psychologists and philosophers study two different phenomena, both of which can serve as grounds for discussion concerning moral luck. However, the author concludes that there are valid reasons to question the normative status of moral intuitions in both psychological and philosophical senses, proving the discussion to be very complicated. On the other hand, he names coherentism as a possible cipher to adequately describe or even solve the problem of moral luck.

Keywords: moral intuition, moral luck, moral judgement

Language: English

Published: Number 1(10)/2015, pp. 41-52

DOI: https://doi.org/10.36280/AFPiFS.2015.1.41

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Number of downloads: 559

Jagiellonian University

English abstract: This paper discusses the use of Bayesian analysis in law. It introduces the key concepts of Bayesian analysis by giving some common examples of criminal cases. It focuses on the advantages of Bayesian analysis over some other probability interpretations (mainly the frequentist one). The last part of the text discusses the general notion of truth in legal proceedings and its possible interpretations within the probabilistic framework – given the Bayesian subjectivists-objectivists discussion.

Keywords: Thomas Bayes, Bayes’ theorem, subjectivism, objectivism

Language: English

Published: Number 1(10)/2015, pp. 31-40

DOI: https://doi.org/10.36280/AFPiFS.2015.1.31

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Number of downloads: 720