Evolution of Natural Law Theory: Tracing the Origins of Western Mainstream Human Rights Views

Author: Shen Jianlin
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2005-05-01
Features: "All existing things have their law." — Montesquieu If there were no natural law, the humble laws of a small peasant community on the Italian Peninsula could never have evolved into the universal laws of later international civilization; if there were no natural law, the synthesis of medieval theological wisdom and secular wisdom would also have been impossible forever; if there were no natural law, there might not have been the later American and French revolutions, and the great ideals of freedom and equality might not have entered people's hearts, let alone the annals of law. — Dentelev This book's topic — Western natural law and human rights issues — belongs to interdisciplinary hot topics and is also a fundamental theoretical issue. The author's interdisciplinary knowledge structure and long-term academic accumulation provide favorable conditions for this research. The connection between natural law and human rights in the study of Western natural law schools is the largest feature of this book. Theoretically, human rights are the core theme of modern and contemporary political philosophy and jurisprudence, and basic political values such as freedom, equality, and democracy can all be attributed to some form of human rights. In reality, human rights are the goal and soul of constitutionalism. As a constitutional concept, the constitution is not just a map of state power, but also a declaration of rights.