Online research in philosophy

The effect of the WTO Agreements within the legal order of the EU has been the object of a fierce controversy in the case law of the Court of First Instance and of the European Court of Justice ever since the conception of the WTO. The case law of the Luxembourg Courts clearly indicates that practitioners seem to have explored practically all the boundaries of this extremely fascinating subject. Direct Effect of WTO law is a collection of essays written over a period of more than ten years and chronicles the evolution in the case law of the European Courts in Luxembourg on the enforceability of GATT and WTO law in the EU legal order. Some of the essays concentrate on more controversial subjects such as the status in the EU legal order of decisions taken by the WTO dispute settlement bodies and the question whether the EU institutions should be held liable under EU law for not acting in conformity with WTO law. The book also contains some essays analyzing the opportunities given to EU companies to enforce WTO law through the application of the so-called Trade Barriers Regulation and gives an almost complete picture of how WTO law can be enforced in the EU legal order by individuals.

‘Law’, in the sense in which I shall use the word here, denotes an order of persons.1 Within this general concept, we can distinguish between natural orders and artificial orders. Natural order, that is natural law, is the order of natural persons. Artificial order, often referred to as positive law, is an order of artificial persons. In the terminology of Rousseau, natural persons are physical persons (‘personnes physiques’), while artificial persons are legal persons (‘personnes morales’).2 Artificial persons are positions, roles or functions in a system of rules, which defines a particular game, organization or society. The rules of the game or society tell us what those artificial persons are, and what they can and cannot do. Examples are White and Black in a game of chess as well as their subdivisions, King, Queen.

On normative order -- On institutional order-- Law and the constitutional state -- A problem : rules or habits? -- On persons -- Wrongs and duties -- Legal positions and relations : rights and obligations -- Legal relations and things : property -- Legal powers and validity -- Powers and public law : law and politics -- Constraints on power : fundamental rights -- Criminal law and civil society : law and morality -- Private law and civil society : law and economy -- Positive law and moral autonomy -- On law and justice -- Law and values : reflections on method.

Legal positivism dominates in the debate between it and natural law, but close attention to the work of Thomas Hobbes – the ``founder'' of the positivist tradition – reveals a version of anti-positivism with the potential to change the contours of that debate. Hobbes's account of law ties law to legitimacy through the legal constraints of the rule of law. Legal order is essential to maintaining the order of civil society; and the institutions of legal order are structured in such a way that government in accordance with the rule of law is intrinsically legitimate. I focus on Hobbes's neglected catalogue of the laws of nature. Only the first group gets much attention. Its function is to facilitate exit from the state of nature, an exit which Hobbes seems to make impossible. The second group sets out the moral psychology of both legislators and subjects necessary to sustain a properly functioning legal order. The third sets out the formal institutional requirements of such an order. The second and third groups show Hobbes not concerned with solving an insoluble problem of exit from the state of nature but with the construction of legitimate order. Because a sovereign is by definition one who governs through law, Hobbes's absolutism is constrained. Government in accordance with the rule of law is government subject to the moral constraints of the institutions of legal order.

Law and order ranks high among the values the State is thought to achieve. Civil disobedience is often condemned because it is held to threaten law and order. Several senses of 'order' are distinguished, which make clear why 'law' and 'order' are so often linked. It is then argued that the connection cannot always be made since the legal system may itself create disorder. Civil disobedience may contribute to greater order and a more stable legal system by helping to remove these causes of disorder. Thus, civil disobedience is sometimes justifiable in terms of its contribution to law and order.

The word 'law' means order, hence natural law is simply the natural order. In the sense in which natural law is relevant to jurists, it is the natural order of persons -- specifically, the order of natural persons: human beings that are capable of rational, purposive action, speech and thought. In short, natural law is the natural order of the human world.

The criminal law depends upon 'commonsense' or 'folk' psychology, a seemingly innate theory used by all normal human beings as a means to understand and predict other humans' behavior. This paper discusses two major types of arguments that commonsense psychology is not a true theory of human behavior, and thus should be eliminated and replaced. The paper argues that eliminitivist projects fail to provide evidence that commonsense psychology is a false theory, and argues that there is no need to seek a replacement theory of behavior for use in the criminal law.