Charles University in Prague

English abstract: The article deals with justification of generally binding legal acts as part of a state governed by the rule of law. The “state of exception” caused by the COVID-19 pandemic adds a new dimension to the issue of justification. The practice prevailing in the Czech Republic in 2020 did not reflect even the minimum requirements for justifying emergency measures, which brought on problems both in the practical application of the adopted measures and in their subsequent judicial review. The article attempts to find an appropriate level of justification, referred to as the threshold of justification and based on the coherentist theory of epistemic justification. The basis of such justification lies in the idea that individual grounds for justification can be found in the explanatory reports of the legislation, on the one hand, and in various pieces of relevant information available to the addressees, on the other hand. All these reasons should form a coherent whole and they should ultimately legitimize restrictions on the freedom of individuals. The final part of the article describes the importance of the threshold of justification for the review of proportionality and even reasonableness of the law.

Keywords: public justification, public reason, coherentism, theory of rational law-making, state of exception, proportionality, reasonableness of the law

Language: English

Published: Number 2(27)/2021, pp. 41-53.

DOI: https://doi.org/10.36280/AFPiFS.2021.2.41

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This text is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution – Non Commercial – No Derivative Works 4.0 International License.

Jan Długosz University in Częstochowa

English abstract: In this paper, the author has undertaken an attempt to adjust Chaïm Perelman and Lucie Olbrechts-Tyteca’s conception of analogy to the province of law. He thus sketches out a pertinent scheme of legal analogy based upon the similarity of proportions and indulges in a consideration of the merits and demerits of such a proposition. To this aim, as the proportions that are compared in such an account of analogy, the relations between the facts of the cases and their legal outcomes were chosen: one such outcome already known and one tentatively posited. Finally, however, the author’s analyses lead to the conclusion that despite its considerable theoretical attractiveness and some mystical charm, legal analogy consisting of the comparison of two proportions is either quite similar to orthodox approaches to analogical reasoning in law or too obscure for one to employ it credibly in the legal setting. In consequence, until its proponents have elucidated the workings of proportional analogy in more detail, the potential use of such a form of analogy in the province of law does not seem promising and cannot be recommended.

Language: English

Keywords: proportion, proportional, proportionality, analogy, legal, Chaïm Perelman, Lucie Olbrechts-Tyteca, account, law, reasoning, approach, logic, apply, analogically

Published: Number 2(13)/2016, pp. 5-13.

DOI: https://doi.org/10.36280/AFPiFS.2016.2.5

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Number of downloads: 1,549