This paper is devoted to clarifying Hannah Arendt’s concept of political freedom (which, at certain points, is markedly obscure) by the means of analysing its structure. My analysis proceeds in three steps. Firstly, I distinguish a pre-political concept of freedom as exercising spontaneity, which is at the root of Arendt’s understanding of political freedom. Secondly, I analyse her account of freedom as exercising action and indicate its relationship to the elementary freedom of spontaneity. Arendt endowed action with a distinguished importance, since she assumed that it is the only activity within the vita activa (the other two being labour and work), which has a special anthropological and axiological significance. According to Arendt, only action allows one to truly experience the fundamental aspect of the human condition, which is the fact of human plurality; it is also the only activity which allows one to exercise specifically public principles, such as solidarity, equality, or justice. Thirdly, I indicate how these two accounts of freedom translate into Arendt’s concept of political freedom. This analysis reveals that the Arendtian concept of political freedom is markedly original. She did not define it in a usual manner, i.e. through indicating bundles of legal and political rights which determine the accepted scope of participation in the public affairs. The inherent part of her concept of political freedom is a specific account of how it must be exercised (i.e. through action). Political freedom understood as the participation in governance exercised through action is not merely an activity of instrumental, but also anthropological and axiological importance, which is due to the special anthropological and axiological meaning of action. In the final section, I discuss the practical dimension of Arendt’s theory. She doubted whether the traditional representative democracy is capable of accommodating her ‘rich’ ideal of political freedom, therefore she proposed an alternative account of political system based on councils. I formulate objections against this proposition and demonstrate that councils would presumably fail to accommodate Arendt’s exacting account of political freedom
Among various modes of the vita activa considered by Hannah Arendt, the ability for action and particularly political action is the crucial one as it endows life with meaning and constitutes human freedom. The question I address in this essay is whether it is possible – according to Arendt – to create active citizenship by means of democratic education. In order to answer this question I consider three models of democratic education, two of which should be rejected if one agrees with Arendt’s assumptions. The third model, aimed at developing abilities to think critically, is the only one that can support those values, which are essential for a healthy democracy.
Celem artykułu jest rekonstrukcja i krytyka koncepcji wolności politycznej przedstawionej na gruncie współczesnego instrumentalnego republikanizmu reprezentowanego przede wszystkim w pracach Philipa Pettita. Instrumentalny republikanizm zakłada, że wolność polityczna jest wartością instrumentalną, służącą realizowaniu naczelnej wartości, jaką jest wolność rozumiana jako nieobecność dominacji. Uznanie nie-dominacji za naczelną wartość pociąga za sobą postulat ograniczenia wolności politycznej, która – jak wskazuje Pettit – może być jednym ze źródeł dominacji (w związku z groźbą tyranii większości). W artykule wskazuję, że argumenty Pettita narażone są na dwa podstawowe zarzuty. Po pierwsze, w wyznaczonym przez niego (zbyt wąskim) zakresie, wolność polityczna nie sprzyja nie-dominacji. Po drugie, skupiając się wyłącznie na instrumentalnej roli wolności politycznej, Pettit pomija jej głębszy wymiar jako wartości demokratycznej. The aim of this article is a reconstruction and critique of the conception of political freedom as understood in contemporary instrumental republicanism, represented primarily by Philip Pettit. Instrumental republicanism endows political freedom with a merely instrumental value, serving as a means to achieving non-domination which, on republican assumptions, is a chief value. From the claim that the value of political freedom is merely instrumental follows a significant limitation of its scope (since outcomes of political freedom are potentially dominating). In this article I claim that Pettit’s arguments are vulnerable to two main objections. First, a significantly limited scope of political freedom does not foster non-domination. Second, having focused on merely instrumental value of political freedom, Pettit does not acknowledge the deeper dimension of political freedom as democratic value.
Celem artykułu jest rekonstrukcja i krytyka koncepcji wolności politycznej przedstawionej na gruncie współczesnego instrumentalnego republikanizmu reprezentowanego przede wszystkim w pracach Philipa Pettita. Instrumentalny republikanizm zakłada, że wolność polityczna jest wartością instrumentalną, służącą realizowaniu naczelnej wartości, jaką jest wolność rozumiana jako nieobecność dominacji. Uznanie nie-dominacji za naczelną wartość pociąga za sobą postulat ograniczenia wolności politycznej, która – jak wskazuje Pettit – może być jednym ze źródeł dominacji (w związku z groźbą tyranii większości). W artykule wskazuję, że argumenty Pettita narażone są na dwa podstawowe zarzuty. Po pierwsze, w wyznaczonym przez niego (zbyt wąskim) zakresie, wolność polityczna nie sprzyja nie-dominacji. Po drugie, skupiając się wyłącznie na instrumentalnej roli wolności politycznej, Pettit pomija jej głębszy wymiar jako wartości demokratycznej. The aim of this article is a reconstruction and critique of the conception of political freedom as understood in contemporary instrumental republicanism, represented primarily by Philip Pettit. Instrumental republicanism endows political freedom with a merely instrumental value, serving as a means to achieving non-domination which, on republican assumptions, is a chief value. From the claim that the value of political freedom is merely instrumental follows a significant limitation of its scope (since outcomes of political freedom are potentially dominating). In this article I claim that Pettit’s arguments are vulnerable to two main objections. First, a significantly limited scope of political freedom does not foster non-domination. Second, having focused on merely instrumental value of political freedom, Pettit does not acknowledge the deeper dimension of political freedom as democratic value.
Recently we are facing increasing application of neuroscience in law, however limited to criminal law and crime detection. The idea to implement neuroscience to trademark protection law is quite new and unexplored. There are however experiments that can make us see the problem in a different light. One of them certainly is Morrin/Jacoby experiment which points out how familiar trademarks can confuse consumers brain. Results of this experiment show that judge’s decision can be enriched with the idea of dilution. In connection with the above it seems understandable that pure idea of infringement ceases to be enough. Consequently, a trademark can be both infringed and diluted. Dilution is defined as an unconscious process which occurs when two or more marks use remarkably like logos, or have very similar names. Shall dilution be applied in law? It seems quite an interesting idea, yet it would lead to extreme inflation of law. Moreover, its theoretical bases are quite frail. Taking all the above mentioned doubts it seems reasonable to be reserved about such concepts.
The Uppsala School in philosophy and the Vienna Circle are prima facie similar currents in contemporary philosophy. Both reject metaphysics, claim that reality is a spatio‑temporal realm and adhere to noncognitivism in terms of values. However, justifications of these assumptions are quite different. In the following article we reconstruct main theses of both mentioned currents and then we indicate their impact on one of the major jurisprudential movements, namely Scandinavian Legal Realism. We focus on Alf Ross’ legal philosophy, as it was an attempt to accommodate both: the philosophy of the Uppsala School and of the Vienna Circle (while other Scandinavian realists referred exclusively to Uppsala philosophy). We trace those two sources of inspiration in Ross’ theory of legal validity and of legal concepts.
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