ROMANIAN CONTRIBUTIONS TO THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE PHILOSOPHY OF LAW

Abstract

The foundation of culture and civilisation, philosophy and the great philosophical systems have been meditations on the nature, essence and purpose of human existence. Knowledge of the fundamental theories, concepts and ideas contained in the whole of legal philosophy, in the work of our philosophers and jurists, is not possible without a broad framework of philosophical and legal debate at world, or at least European, level. The present study falls into the category of restitutions due, in terms of knowledge and appreciation of the remarkable contributions of some Romanian specialists in the philosophy of law, many of which have long been forgotten, distorted, truncated or simply eliminated from the national scientific heritage. At the same time, the work aims to highlight the social need for philosophy of law, to highlight the value of Romanian contributions at a time when, in global society, there is a tendency to ignore and fade away specific valuable contributions, capable of entering the universal heritage of legal thought. In Romania, the beginnings of the philosophy of law coincide with the awakening of a unitary national sentiment, based on the idea of the Romanian origin of the nation. We can consider as important landmarks in the birth, evolution and development of the philosophy of law in Romania, the works of the chroniclers of the 17th and 18th centuries (some of whom were true philosophers of public law) or the first codification of private law, through the work of various jurists. The interwar period brought an increasing affirmation of the concerns devoted to the philosophy of law in Romania. We note the major contributions to the development and affirmation of the philosophy of law in Romania by authors such as Alexandru Văllimărescu, Traian Ionașcu, Petre Pandrea, Radu Goruneanu, Dumitru Drăghicescu. Eugeniu Speranția, author of an impressive work in the field of philosophy of law, was a first-rate thinker and true encyclopedic spirit. Mircea Djuvara was above all the Romanian authors who devoted their lives and work to legal-philosophical writings, a representative personality of Romanian culture, founder of an original system of thought of great theoretical and methodological value. What is the encyclopaedia of law; subjective and objective in law; thinking, judgement and the value of judgement; objective and subjective theory of value; the finality of law in relation to the judgement of legal value; the concept and idea of justice; legal methodology; the "problem" of subjective law. The relationship between the individual and the social environment (or the relationship between freedom and determinism); the relationship between law - morality - religion; the role and importance of the philosophy of law; the definition of law; norm and normativity; objective law - subjective law; the state - the outgrowth of the need for justice; spirit and law; the opposition between social and biological determinism, the modern doctrine of punishment, are just a few themes of reflection brought to Romanian philosophical thought and which are meant to highlight the real contribution of Romanian philosophers of law to the development and affirmation of the philosophy of law in the world as a whole, in an attempt to explain and evaluate the principles on which one of the major dimensions of human existence is based, the normative (ethical and legal) dimension.