Honor and Dignity in the Film Unforgiven: Implications for Sociolegal Theory

This article calls attention to "honor" and "dignity" as two fundamental, antithetical bases of unique value systems, both highly significant to social orders and legal systems in the contemporary Western world. The article argues that in this comparative context, the relatively new dignity-based value system may be better defined and articulated; at the same time, the overlooked, traditional honor-based value system, which underlies much of contemporary reality, can be better identified and replaced or at least modified by a dignity-based one. Rather than look to specific sociolegal realities, the article presents this line of thought from a "law-and-film" perspective, i.e., through the close reading of a single feature film: Clint Eastwood's Unforgiven . This contemporary, widely familiar, and immensely popular Western exposes the ugly face of the honor-based value system at the heart of the Western film genre; further, it subversively undermines this value system, replacing it with a dignity-based one. In so doing, the film expresses deep faith in the human capacity to transform, calling on real-world social and legal systems to follow in its footsteps and apply the same critical analysis and reformative activism to Western law and society at large.     

傲慢与权利:法律如何处理人的尊严问题

近期通过网络引起社会轰动的诸案件,其关键皆在于尊严冲突。尊严冲突是导致几乎所有纠纷的基本原因。法律处理尊严冲突时存在两个基本标准:普遍的可接受性和双方的可接受性,调解机制在维护双方尊严上有利有弊。法律处理尊严冲突的有效性条件在于存在社会共通价值并在个案中具备灵活性。网络媒体的兴起加剧了处理冲突的难度,也提供了有利的契机。     

法治与人性尊严——从实践到理论的反思

作为现代民主宪政社会不可或缺的生活形态,法治的意义及其核心价值,不论在具体法律实践或抽象理论阐述上,却依然存在着极大争议。"大法官会议"以人性尊严为本的法治观点,毋宁是一种"自由民主宪政秩序"的法治观点。无论是形式合法性或民主程序的法治要件,均无法在法治的具体实践上,保证执政者或立法者不会借助法治的形式要件,来追求满足其政治野心或个人私欲的不正当目的。法治理想的追求,应当着重法律实质内容的道德论证质量。就人性尊严的内涵来说,德沃金提出的两项人性尊严原则,内在价值原则与个人责任原则,确实是值得我们反思借镜的理论资源;特别是,他对人的内在价值的诠释,亦即人具有由自然与人类共同创造的神圣、不可侵犯的客观价值,适足以填补大法官人性尊严观的论述盲点。     

Pride and Right: the Law how to Deal with the Issue of Human Dignity

近期通过网络引起社会轰动的诸案件,其关键皆在于尊严冲突.尊严冲突是导致几乎所有纠纷的基本原因.法律处理尊严冲突时存在两个基本标准:普遍的可接受性和双方的可接受性,调解机制在维护双方尊严上有利有弊.法律处理尊严冲突的有效性条件在于存在社会共通价值并在个案中具备灵活性.网络媒体的兴起加剧了处理冲突的难度,也提供了有利的契机.     

Observations on the Development of Human Dignity and Personality in German Constitutional Law: An Overview

This paper provides an overview of the development of the constitutional value of human dignity under German constitutional law. First, it provides a background to the German constitutional order then it places the constitutional value of dignity within the framework of the constitutional court’s jurisprudence on personality rights. It then progresses to an examination of specific cases that have developed personality rights and the importance of the constitutional court’s interpretation of personality and dignity in the personal and outer spheres within the framework of the German legal order. The article concludes with some observations and comparisons between German and American law in this area.     

法律全球化：争论与出路

围绕着法律全球化问题,我国学者产生了有没有、要不要和如何进行的三重争议,由于这些争议是在没有对全球化做出前提性界定的基础上进行的,所以总是陷入事实与价值两极之争的困境之中。我们引入“过程”论来理解全球化的思想,意在指出从发展路向上看全球化有不同的阶段且每个阶段都有它的内在规定性。从当下的阶段来看,全球化已经把世界联结为一个异质的整体,从性质上说这个整体是事实和价值的统一体。它们一起对法律全球化的过程、制度和理念起着规制作用。理解这种“过程”论要求我们从根本上转换现代法的精神,即促进权利范式的发展、培育新的自由理念和参与全球法律制度竞争与全球治理。     

法律、政治和市场的全球化对国内法的影响：以欧洲为视角

本文以全球化进程、国际化进程以及新旧国家主义的强对抗力量为背景,分析了国际体系的新的错综复杂性及其对国内法的影响。在第一部分,作者引入全球化的概念及其是否发生的国际背景。第二部分,作者描述和分析了在贸易和环境领域,关税与贸易总协定、经济合作和发展组织和欧共体框架内在全球化过程中的主要战略、机制和手段。基于上文论述,作者在第三部分认为在国际模式下,主要是通过缔结国际协议迫使各国将国际法律义务转变为国内法,而在超国家模式下,立法全球化的影响是直接的。选择何种模式,必须作出许多政治性决策:必须决定全球化是一个可取的结局;必须决定全球化问题认知达到必要程度的方法以及更可取的解决问题方法;必须改变传统市场导向方式。作者还建议美国和欧共体成员国要对国际政治、经济和法律事务的传统民族国家为中心的认知进行修正。     

Environmental Enforcement Undertakings and Possible Implications: Responsive,Smarter or Rent Seeking?

Enforcement undertakings have recently been added to the Environment Agency's list of mechanisms available for the enforcement of certain environmental offences. An enforcement undertaking is a written agreement between the regulator and the offender in which the offender proposes to undertake particular actions in relation to the relevant non‐compliant activity. This article examines the use of enforcement undertakings by the Environment Agency, arguing that the undertakings have significant regulatory implications and give rise to a series of possible problems. Notwithstanding this, the article concludes that enforcement undertakings possess a number of potentially positive features, making them a useful alternative to existing enforcement mechanisms.     

我国担保法制度设计应当重视的几个基本问题——基于民法、经济法和法经济学的综合视角

担保制度是保障交易安全、促进经济发展的重要法律手段。科学、合理的担保制度,应当充分利用一切可以利用的担保资源,最大限度地控制担保制度对物的利用及社会生活其他方面产生的负面影响,并能有效地促进经济的发展。基于此,中国担保法律制度的安排应当认真处理好五个方面的基本问题。     

制定法与习惯法之间的潜规则——可供阅读的另类秩序

制定法是一种规则 ,习惯法也是一种规则。在制定法与习惯法之间 ,还存在着第三种规则 ,即本文所讨论的潜规则。潜规则是一种值得认真对待的另类规则 ,因为它也代表了一种实际存在的另类秩序。     

Beyond the Goods/Resources Dichotomy: Animal Labor and Trade Law

Abstract

Since its inception, the World Trade Organization (WTO) has, in a rather self-evident manner, treated animals as objects of trade: Animals must be either goods or natural resources subject to the terms and conditions of the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT). However, broader public and legal efforts to recategorize animals from goods to “sentient beings,” which are emerging across the world, are casting serious doubt on these assumptions. Using animals’ subjectivity as a starting point, a new and bourgeoning strand of anthropological, ethical, and political studies argues that animals should properly be recognized as working subjects. Be it guide dogs, truffle hogs, logging elephants, or dairy cows—working animals, they argue, are owed wholly new legal and ethical duties. This article builds on these arguments to examine the consequences of “animal labor” for trade law: Are animals wrongly classified as commodities or resources? Is there a need and room to recognize animals as service providers under the General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS)? What are the legal consequences of this proposed change? This article sets out to answer these questions and argues that recognizing animals as workers in trade law is conceptually coherent and can play a crucial role in empowering states to protect animals effectively at the international level.     

The New Codification of Civil Law and Protection of the Honor and Dignity of the Citizen

With the issuance of the Principles of Civil Legislation of the USSR and the Union Republics, the first, but very important, stage in the new codification of Soviet civil legislation to correspond with the needs of the period of the comprehensive building of communism has been realized. What must now follow is the adoption of civil codes by the union republics, in which the general, fundamental and primary propositions of the Principles will be appropriately concretized and detailed, developed and augmented.     

Dignity, Harm, and Hate Speech

This paper examines two recent contributions to the hate speech literature – by Steven Heyman and Jeremy Waldron – which seek a justification for the legal restriction of hate speech in an account of the way that hate speech infringes against people’s dignity. These analyses look beyond the first-order hurts and disadvantages suffered by the immediate targets of hate speech, and consider the prospect of hate speech sustaining complex social structures whose wide-scale operations lower the social status of members of targeted groups. In Heyman’s and Waldron’s accounts we find plausible insights into the nature of identity-based social hierarchies, and the harms that redound to subordinated people under the operations of such hierarchies. I argue, however, that both analyses are unsuccessful as justifications for the restriction of hate speech, because they do not ultimately provide reason to think that hate speech is responsible for creating or sustaining identity-based social hierarchies.