Juristenrecht
| Autor | Riccardo Guastini |
| Páginas | 121-147 |
121
iv. “juristenrecht”*
1. “exPositoRy” Vs. “censoRial juRisPRudence”
La concepción positivista de la ciencia jurídica –en-
tendida como discurso axiológicamente neutro, wert-
frei– nace con la distinción de jeReMy benthaM entre
expository jurisprudence y censorial jurisprudence: esto es,
podríamos decir, entre “jurisprudencia descriptiva”
y “jurisprudencia crítica”1. “A book of jurisprudence
–escribe bentham– can have but one or the other of two
objects: 1. to ascertain what the law is; 2. to ascertain
what it ought to be. In the former case it may be styled a
book of expository jurisprudence; in the latter, a book of
censorial jurisprudence: or, in other words, a book on the
art of legislation”2.
* Traducción de dieGo dei Vecchi. Una versión diferente (en
inglés) de este trabajo fue presentada en el congreso interna-
cional “First Conference on Philosophy and Law. Neutrality
and Theory of Law”, Girona, mayo de 2010.
1 En este contexto “jurisprudencia” tiene el sentido originario
de “prudentia (o sapientia) juris”.
2 J. benthaM, An Introduction to the Principles of Morals and Le-
gislation, ed. por J.H. buRns y H.L.A. haRt, Clarendon Press,
Oxford, 1996, pp. 293 ss.
122 RiccaRdo Guastini
Hace eco de la distinción de benthaM una bien
conocida afirmación de john austin: “The existence of
law is one thing, its merit or demerit is another, whether
it be or be not is one enquiry; whether it be or be not con-
formable to an assumed standard, is a different enquiry.
A law, which actually exists, is a law though we happen
to dislike it, or though it vary from the text, by which we
regulate our approbation and disapprobation”3.
El mismo punto de vista asume hans kelsen: su
“teoría pura” propone satisfacer “the required separation of
legal science from politics”4; la teoría pura “is being kept free
from all the elements foreign to the specific method of a science
whose only purpose is the cognition of law […]. A science
has to describe its object as it actually is, not to prescribe as
it should be or should not be from the point of view of some
specific value judgments. The latter is a problem of politics,
and, as such, concerns the art of government, an activity
directed at values, not an object of science, directed at reality”5.
3 J. austin, Lectures on Jurisprudence or The Philosophy of Positive
Law, 4ª ed., R. caMPbell, john MuRRay, London, 1879, I, p.
220. Cfr. también en pp. 33 y 176 y ss.: “General jurisprudence
[…] is concerned with law as it necessarily is, rather than with
law as it ought to be; with law as it must be, be it good or bad,
rather than with law as it must be, if it be good”; “The science
of jurisprudence […] is concerned with positive laws […] as
considered without regard to their goodness or badness”.
4 H. kelsen, Introduction to the Problems of Legal Theory (1934),
B. litscheWski Paulson y S.L. Paulson eds., Clarendon Press,
Oxford, 1992, p. 3.
5 H. kelsen, General Theory of Law and State, Harvard U.P.,
Cambridge (Mass.), 1945, p. xiV.
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