The Principles of European Law on Commercial Agency, Franchise and Distribution Contracts are an academic proposal of the Study Group on a European Civil Code for the European-wide regulation of the contents of these three types of agreements. The academic analysis "Franchising in European Contract Law" focuses on the harmonised Principles on Franchising. At present all member states of the EU have their own regulation on franchising. This situation might change in the light of the political process of Europeanization of (...) contract law that was initiated by the European Commission in 2001. As a result of that process the Principles on Franchising could be declared a set of rules which might be opted for by the parties to franchising contracts Europe-wide to govern their relationship. In this analysis the main obligations in franchising in PEL CAFDC are compared with those under French and Spanish law. The main conclusion of this thesis research has been that the main obligations of parties in franchising under the PEL CAFDC resemble those under French and Spanish law. Eventually, differences will arise depending on how national courts weigh the interests of the parties in each case. A second conclusion has been that a choice for the PEL CAFDC instead of for French and Spanish law could be considered a rational alternative concerning the applicable system of remedies and legal certainty. (shrink)

In Spain, any person under the age of 18 is a minor. Generally, minors lack the legal capacity to take legally binding actions because they are deemed incapable of legally binding consent. Spanish civil law recognises, however, that the child, in accordance with the law and being sufficiently mature, may act for himself. It stands, then, that consent, as expressed by the “sufficiently mature” minor, should be legally valid.

This article provides an overview of recent contributions to the debate on the ethical use of previously collected biobank samples, as well as a country report about how this issue has been regulated in Spain by means of the new Biomedical Research Act, enacted in the summer of 2007. By contrasting the Spanish legal situation with the wider discourse of international bioethics, we identify and discuss a general trend moving from the traditional requirements of informed consent towards new models (...) more favourable to research in a post‐genomic context. (shrink)

Human rights discourse has been likened to a global lingua franca, and in more ways than one, the analogy seems apt. Human rights discourse is a language that is used by all yet belongs uniquely to no particular place. It crosses not only the borders between nation-states, but also the divide between national law and international law: it appears in national constitutions and international treaties alike. But is it possible to conceive of human rights as a global language or lingua (...) franca not just in a figurative or metaphorical sense, but in a literal or linguistic sense as a legal dialect defined by distinctive patterns of word choice and usage? Does there exist a global language of human rights that transcends not only national borders, but also the divide between domestic and international law? Empirical analysis suggests that the answer is yes, but this global language comes in at least two variants or dialects. New techniques for performing automated content analysis enable us to analyze the bulk of all national constitutions over the last two centuries, together with the world’s leading regional and international human rights instruments, for patterns of linguistic similarity and to evaluate how much language, if any, they share in common. Specifically, we employ a technique known as topic modeling that disassembles texts into recurring verbal patterns. The results highlight the existence of two species or dialects of rights talk—the universalist dialect and the positive-rights dialect—both of which are global in reach and rising in popularity. The universalist dialect is generic in content and draws heavily on the type of language found in international and regional human rights instruments. It appears in particularly large doses in the constitutions of transitional states, developing states, and states that have been heavily exposed to the influence of the international community. The positive-rights dialect, by contrast, is characterized by its substantive emphasis on positive rights of a social or economic variety, and by its prevalence in lengthier constitutions and constitutions from outside the common law world, especially those of the Spanish-speaking world. Both dialects of rights talk are truly transnational, in the sense that they appear simultaneously in national, regional, and international legal instruments and transcend the distinction between domestic and international law. Their existence attests to the blurring of the boundary between constitutional law and international law. (shrink)

This article provides an overview of recent contributions to the debate on the ethical use of previously collected biobank samples, as well as a country report about how this issue has been regulated in Spain by means of the new Biomedical Research Act, enacted in the summer of 2007. By contrasting the Spanish legal situation with the wider discourse of international bioethics, we identify and discuss a general trend moving from the traditional requirements of informed consent towards new models (...) more favourable to research in a post‐genomic context. (shrink)

This article provides an overview of recent contributions to the debate on the ethical use of previously collected biobank samples, as well as a country report about how this issue has been regulated in Spain by means of the new Biomedical Research Act, enacted in the summer of 2007. By contrasting the Spanish legal situation with the wider discourse of international bioethics, we identify and discuss a general trend moving from the traditional requirements of informed consent towards new models (...) more favourable to research in a post-genomic context. (shrink)

On 30 June 2005, the Spanish Parliament approved Law 13/2005, which amends the Civil Code to permit same-sex marriage. This formal equality measure put Spain in the spotlight of the international media. It is the culmination of a series of developments spanning from the last years of the Franco regime (which ended in 1975), through the enactment of anti-discrimination measures in 1995, to the recent fight for kinship recognition. It also follows a recent shift, from 1998 to 2005, towards (...) the enactment of same-sex partnership laws at regional level, the approval of same-sex marriage and finally, the approval of a ‹gender identity law’ (2007). This legislative note assesses the context in which the new law on same-sex marriage has been enacted. I argue that although same-sex marriage has been represented by many activists and politicians in Spain as a gender neutral contract, it has the potential for differential impacts on lesbians and gay men, and further research and debates are needed in this area. (shrink)

What is viral law? In order to being my discussion, I note that the last two years have been extremely difficult to understand and that we, meaning those who have lived through the pandemic, have struggled to make sense. Thus, I make the argument that the virus has impacted upon not only the individual’s ability to make sense in a world where every day routines have been upended, but also social and political structures that similarly rely on repetition to continue (...) to function. According to this thesis, Covid-19 is more than simply a biological organism, but also a cultural virus that undermines the organisation of social, political, and economic systems and requires new ways of thinking about how we might move forward into a post-Covid world. In the name of beginning this project of making sense of Covid-19, I track back in history to the comparable reference point of the Spanish flu pandemic of 1918–1920 and, in particular, a reading of Freud’s Beyond the Pleasure Principle, which the founder of psychoanalysis wrote in the shadow of the virus. In reading Freud’s attempt to write a psychology of death in the context of this funereal period of history, I argue that he set out first, a mythological theory of viral law concerned with the death drive, before turning to second, a techno-scientific, biological theory of the same law characterised by microbial immortality. Beyond this exploration of Beyond the Pleasure Principle, in the third part of the article I turn to a reading of Lacan’s interpretation of Freud’s work, where viral law becomes a story of cybernetics and nihilistic mechanisation. Here, perfect mechanisation, and the endless oscillation between message and noise, looks a lot like living death. Finally, I take up Derrida’s critique of Jacob’s molecular biology and, by extension, Freud’s theory of microbial immorality, that he thinks privileges an idea of repetitive sameness and opens up a space for cultural politics concerned with immunity against otherness. Derrida’s key point here is that this biological fantasy ignores the reality of viral sex that enables evolution to happen. What this means is that the other, even in its microbial form, is ever present, and that we must recognise the importance of difference to the possibility of social, political, and economic change. (shrink)

Spanish Jesuits such as Francisco Suárez (1548-1617), José de Acosta (1540-1600), Pedro de Ribadeneira (1526-1611) and Juan de Mariana (1536-1624) had a powerful impact on English thinkers of the magnitude of John Locke (1632-1704), Francis Bacon (1561-1626), Robert Persons (1546-1610), Algernon Sidney (1623-1683), and later, William Robertson (1721-1793), Thomas de Quincey (1785-1859) and Hilaire Belloc (1870-1953). An influence that was sometimes hidden and always controversial. This work highlights the importance of this influence regarding thought on politics, law and natural (...) rights. A constitutionalist understanding of political power, the recognition and promotion of innate rights and the necessary subjection of rulers to the law, all form part of the important legacy of these scholastic doctors for European intellectual heritage. (shrink)

This book highlights the powerful impact of some important Spanish Jesuits (Suárez, Acosta, Ribadeneira, Mariana) on some relevant English thinkers such as Locke, Bacon, and others, regarding politics, law and natural rights, an influence sometimes hidden and always controversial.

In March 2021, the Spanish Congress approved the law regulating euthanasia, that regulates both euthanasia and physician-assisted suicide (PAS). In this article, we analyse the Spanish law regulating euthanasia and PAS, comparing it with the rest of the European laws on euthanasia and PAS (Netherlands, Belgium and Luxembourg). Identified strengths of the Spanish law, with respect to other norms, are that it is a law with many safeguards, which broadly recognises professionals’ right to conscientious objection and the (...) specification that it makes on the prior comprehensive care of the patient, including the approach to care dependency. Regarding its shortcomings, the law does not differentiate well between euthanasia and PAS; it barely assigns a role to the healthcare team as a whole (similar to other regulations); it does not clarify the functions of the different professionals involved; it does not detail the specific composition and duration of theevaluation commission; it has not been accompanied by a prior or simultaneous regulation of palliative care; and, lastly, the period of time to implement the law is too short. (shrink)

Normal 0 21 false false false ES X-NONE X-NONE MicrosoftInternetExplorer4 /* Style Definitions */ table.MsoNormalTable {mso-style-name:"Tabla normal"; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0; mso-tstyle-colband-size:0; mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-priority:99; mso-style-qformat:yes; mso-style-parent:""; mso-padding-alt:0cm 5.4pt 0cm 5.4pt; mso-para-margin:0cm; mso-para-margin-bottom:.0001pt; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:11.0pt; font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif"; mso-ascii-font-family:Calibri; mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-theme-font:minor-fareast; mso-hansi-font-family:Calibri; mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-bidi;} This essay deals with Hobbes notion of natural law in order to point out some tensions and difficulties brought by this notion into his political thought. The article shows that the Hobbes idea of justice cannot be (...) completely inscribed in legal positivism but, coming close to it, maintains some vestiges of the natural law tradition, which, however do not correspond very well with his idea of an absolute state. In addition, the essay considers some notions and propositions of contractualism and points out its incompatibility with authoritarianism. (shrink)

A serious yet unstudied consequence of the Christian-Muslim conflict in medieval Spain was the capture and enslavement of soldiers and civilians. Men, women, and children who were seized on raids, taken in battle, or pirated off ships were regarded by their captors as booty, to be used as slaves or to be sold for profit. Since warfare in twelfth-century Spain pitted Christians against Muslims, the usual prohibitions against enslavement of coreligionists clearly did not apply. For Muslims and Christians alike, capture (...) meant a life of slavery. Christian chronicles of this era are replete with stories of captives taken off to be sold in the slave markets of al-Andalus in southern Spain or, even worse, in those of North Africa. Some of these slaves, however, were able to regain their freedom through redemption — that is, to purchase their liberty by paying a ransom. Since the ransom price frequently exceeded what could be gained in the slave auctions, redemption became an attractive option to both captor and captive. (shrink)

The present research study carries out a contrastive analysis between two corpora of legal opinion columns as special types of genres, with a view to assess their opposing patterns of impersonality—authorial detachment—and attitude—emotion, judgment, appreciation, taking as a point of departure appraisal theory, or the interpretation of Halliday's Systemic-Functional Linguistics by the so-called Sydney School. The long-established perspective is that legal genres are highly impersonal; authoritative instruments representing an intentional exercise of elitist and exclusionary practices. However, the hypothesis embedded in (...) the present study is that some texts, such as news editorials and op-eds, constitute hybrid genres where the writer makes use of all kinds of inducement devices to support his/her theses with effectiveness and credibility, nonetheless retaining one of the basic traits of monogloss legal discourse: impersonality. However, it is hypothesized that this hybridity is to take place in different degrees, in tune with the influence exerted by legal system that constitutes the background of each corpus. To prove such a point, 40 legal op-eds—roughly, a thirty-five-thousand-word corpus in English and Spanish overall—were scrutinized, having been extracted from the specialized legal sections of two national newspapers of undisputed prestige as opinion-formation media. Through a contrastive study, the purpose of the present work was set to describe, explain and assess how lexicogrammar devices unveil interesting differences between the expression of impersonality and attitude in legal opinion columns as genres in either language, hence reflecting different ways in which the law is envisioned in each of the particular legal systems they belong to. (shrink)

In this paper, we try to show that the existing Spanish secular model should be defined in terms of collaboration. Religious freedom is interpreted by Spanish judges in a Catholic framework, as an implementation of the Second Vatican Council's Declarations and Constitutions. In this sense, the Catholic Church has managed to impose its authority through privileged agreements with the Spanish State. _Keywords:_ religious freedom, secularism, Spain, religious law.

The present work examines the role of persuasive lexicon in legal discourse through the analysis of emotional devices at a lexical and rhetorical level. Our preliminary premise is that emotion is deployed by experts to convey the sentiment of shared values and epistemic trust: the need to rely on the tenets of the law as fair and conducive to the common good. The corpus of our study is constituted by the conclusions in their original Spanish, and their translation into (...) English, by the Advocate General Manuel Campos on the challenge by Hungary and Poland of the regulation establishing a “conditionality regime” in the event of a rule-of-law breach in a EU Member State. To this end, we undertake a two-pronged analysis of legal persuasion to find out what emotional devices are deployed to convey the rule-of-law principles of justice, non-discrimination, equality and solidarity. At a first stage, we concentrate upon the polarity and intensity of emotion words and their categories. Emotional implicatures in the shape of legal technolects and metaphorical ontologies and the way they are deployed in each text constitutes the second part of our study. Among our conclusions are that both the original and target texts have a strong persuasive character, mainly grounded in the negative emotion of fear and the positive emotion of trust, and that there are variances in the emotional language deployed in either version due to the different mechanics of each law system and to functional differences between English and Spanish. (shrink)

Background: By providing healthcare to adolescents, a major opportunity is created to help them cope with the challenges in their lives, develop healthy behaviour and become responsible healthcare consumers. Confidentiality is a major issue in adolescent healthcare, and its perceived absence may be the main barrier to an adolescent seeking medical care. Little is known, however, about confidentiality for adolescents in primary care practices in Spain.Objective: To ascertain the attitudes of Spanish family doctors towards the right of adolescents to (...) confidentiality in different healthcare situations and in the prescription of treatment.Method: A descriptive postal questionnaire was self-administered by family doctors.Results: Parents of patients under 18 years are always informed by 18.5% of family doctors, whereas parents of those under 16 years are informed by 38.8% of doctors. The patients are warned of this likelihood by 79.3% of doctors. The proportion of doctors supporting confidentiality for adolescents increases with the age and maturity of the patients, whereas workload and previous training has a negative effect.Conclusions: Spanish laws on adolescent healthcare are not reflected by the paternalistic attitude that Spanish primary care doctors have towards their adolescent patients. Doctors need to be provided with up-to-date and clinically relevant explanations on contemporary legal positions. In primary care, more attention should be paid to adolescents’ rights to information, privacy and confidentiality. Doctors should be more aware of the need to encourage communication between teenagers and their parents, while also safeguarding their patients’ rights to confidential care. (shrink)

Resumen: El presente trabajo se centra en el análisis del Anteproyecto de reforma de la legislación civil española en materia de capacidad jurídica de las personas con discapacidad publicado recientemente por el Gobierno español. Su objetivo consiste en determinar la adecuación de las principales modificaciones planteadas en este anteproyecto a las exigencias del artículo 12 de la Convención Internacional sobre los Derechos de las Personas con Discapacidad tal y como han sido interpretadas por su Comité en la Observación General Nº1 (...) Abstract: This paper focuses on the analysis of the prelimimary Draf Law of reform of the Spanish civil legislation on legal capacity of persons with disabilities, published by the Spanish Government on September 26th 2018. Its aim is to determine the conformity of the main modifications proposed in this preliminary Draft to the requirements of article 12 of the Conventionon the Rights of Persons with Disabilitiesas interpreted by its Committee in the General Comment Nº 1. (shrink)

A Companion to the Spanish Scholastics offers a much-needed survey of the entire field of early modern Spanish scholastic thought. The volume introduces main themes and contexts of scholastics inquiry (theology, philosophy, ethics, politics, economics, law, science and the senses) through close examination of a wide range of texts, debates, methods, and authors, as well as in-depth discussion of the relevant literature. Each chapter includes a useful bibliography and serves as point of departure for future research. The volume (...) not only draws the sum of existing research, but also challenges established notions and breaks new ground. (shrink)

Resumen: Tras varios meses de debate, Francia acaba de sustituir en el Código Penal la expresión “identidad sexual” por la de “identidad de género”, incluyendo por fin el concepto de género en el texto legal. Este artículo, que es una humilde reflexión sobre la utilidad de dicho reconocimiento, recoge los principales argumentos alegados durante la fase prelegislativa. He realizado el trabajo desde una perspectiva comparada, ya que el debate surgido en el país galo es semejante al que tuvo lugar en (...) España en 2004, cuando se introdujo la perspectiva de género en el Código Penal. Abstract: After months of debate, the term “sexual identity” stated in the French Penal Code has been replaced with “gender identity”, thus finally incorporating the concept of gender within its legal text. This article, which is a humble reflection about the usefulness of this replacement, gathers the main arguments alleged for during the pre-legislative phase. This research has been carried out from a comparative perspective, since the debate which arose in France is similar to the one which took place in Spain in 2004, when the gender perspective was introduced in the Spanish Penal. (shrink)

In this paper the author examines certain ideas of the Spanish School of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries which directly inspired the School of Hugo Grotius in the seventeenth, thus opening the way towards possible declarations of human rights such as that of United Nations. The line of thought which extends from Francisco de Vitoria (1492/93–1546) to Francisco Suárez (1548–1617) is given the name of the “Spanish natural law and law of nations School.”.

Normal 0 21 false false false ES-CO X-NONE X-NONE MicrosoftInternetExplorer4 /* Style Definitions */ table.MsoNormalTable {mso-style-name:"Tabla normal"; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0; mso-tstyle-colband-size:0; mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-priority:99; mso-style-qformat:yes; mso-style-parent:""; mso-padding-alt:0cm 5.4pt 0cm 5.4pt; mso-para-margin:0cm; mso-para-margin-bottom:.0001pt; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:10.0pt; font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif"; mso-bidi-font-family:CalistoMT;} From his theory of communicative action (1981) until his later political writings, the philosopher Jürgen Habermas has put on the juridical language the main responsibility of describing the essence of Civil Society. That´s why the Habermasian analysis becomes a defence of a capitalistic conception of the actual society, (...) turning around a strict notion of individual. (shrink)

The Yearbook of Private International Law series, an annual publication now published by Sellier. European Law Publishers in cooperation with the Swiss Institute of Comparative Law, provides analysis and information on private international law developments world-wide. This sixth volume looks rather "Euro-centric", due to the impressive and continuous rhythm at which the creation of a European system of PIL is progressing at the European Community level. Contributions include discussion of the proposal for a Rome II regulation on conflict of laws (...) in torts, as well as an analysis of the Avello decision, which could create a new framework for the development of PIL in Europe. Additional articles focus on the national conflict systems of some European states. An important comparative study discusses the treatment of foreign tax laws and judgments in four major European countriesâ??United Kingdom, Germany, France, and Italy. The actual and controversial issue of registered partnership is discussed from the perspective of Spanish law. Additionally, an English translation of the latest national PIL codificationâ??the recent Belgian Codeâ??is included. (shrink)

Spain occupies an area of 504.645 km, and it has a population of 46.5 million people, out of which 4,538,503 are immigrants. Life expectancy is 82.5 years. Its economy grew 1.4 % in 1014. Its current Constitution was enacted in 1978. It has been part of the European Union since 1986. Spain is a social and democratic state subject to the rule of law. Liberty, justice, equality, and political pluralism are the highest values of the legal order of the rule (...) of law. Spain is a constitutional monarchy with a parliamentary government. The legislative power rests upon two chambers: the Congress and Senate. The government exercises the executive powers and the regulatory powers. There have been six presidents since 1978 from all parties, socialist, centrist, and conservative. The judicial power rests upon the courts and tribunals established by law. (shrink)

This article looks at the ways in which Spanish American women exploited the political and social turmoil of the late 18th and early 19th centuries to move beyond their traditional sphere of influence in the home. Women directly participated in the Túpac Amaru Rebellion (1780–1781) and in the Wars of Independence (1810–1825) providing funding, food supplies, infrastructure and reinforcements for the troops, and nursing the wounded. Others contributed by taking part in the physical fighting (both openly and disguised as (...) men) and a few led troops into battle. This article looks at some of the individuals behind the statistics and reveals their determination to participate despite the punishments imposed on women found guilty of disloyalty to the Spanish crown. Spanish colonial law had to be amended to ensure that women dissidents were given as equally harsh sentences as men. In the immediate post-independence period, rather than be seen as misfits or a threat to the patriarchal system, several of these women were given national awards. (shrink)

The Spanish future subjunctive demonstrates how linguistics can inform modern language policy. The FS is described as an archaism to be eliminated from contemporary legal texts. We analyze a corpus of over 3000 tokens of the FS in Spanish legal texts dated between the 13th and 16th century. The FS has two functions in legal discourse. The casuistic function allows for indicating paradigmatic subordination; the forwarding function introduces new information. Our quantitative results suggest an increase in the usage (...) frequency of the FS in legal discourse, where an inverse trend appears in other genres. As shown by a linear regression analysis, the FS started appearing significantly closer to the beginning of the law article, indicating an increase in the forwarding function in time. In view of our results, reformers of legal Spanish should consider the functions of the FS in legal discourse when advising its suppression. (shrink)

Name der Zeitschrift: Studies in Logic, Grammar and Rhetoric Jahrgang: 45 Heft: 1 Seiten: 277-287.

In the original publication of the article, the word “Appraisal” was omitted in the article title. It was updated in this correction. The original article has been corrected.

This study investigates the relative roles of frequency and transparency in native speakers’ comprehension of Spanish object relative sentences by comparing performance with two variants of the construction that differ in these properties. Experiment 1 suggests that seven- to eight-year-old children’s processing of object relative sentences is consistently facilitated by variant frequency and likely relies on separate representations for each variant as two different, although related constructions. Experiment 2 turns to adult comprehension of the two variants, showing similar accuracy (...) and reaction time patterns for both variants for this population. This second outcome could be interpreted as a decrease in frequency effects over time, in line with the power law of practice, as an experience-based increase in the ability to make use of redundant markers, or both. (shrink)

With Spanish the third most widely spoken language in the world, one would expect more Spanish translations of important texts in American philosophy. Given the recent publication of a Spanish translation of The Public and Its Problems (1927), more people have access to John Dewey’s ideas about democracy than ever before. A broader readership might bring greater inclusivity to the existing debate over the significance of Dewey’s legacy for democratic theory. For the past few years, this debate (...) has raged almost exclusively between English-speaking scholars. Many have responded to the arguments of Richard Posner, the law professor and Circuit Court judge who delivered a scathing critique of Dewey’s legacy in his book Law, Pragmatism and Democracy (2003). Even if new readers of The Public and Its Problems fail to join the debate, they will at least be better equipped to evaluate Posner’s arguments with some appreciation for the object of his criticism. Hopefully they will come to acknowledge Dewey’s contribution as a vital thread in the tapestry of thought making up contemporary currents in democratic theory—currents that University of Toronto professor Frank Cunningham collectively labels “democratic pragmatism.” See his Theories of Democracy (Routledge, 2002). Ramon Del Castillo’s introduction to the translation captures the rich context of Dewey’s work on democratic theory. It places the book in the proper historical milieu, 1920s America at the time of the height and decline of American Progressivism. It also juxtaposes The Public and Its Problems against Lippmann’s two earlier works, Public Opinion (1922) and The Phantom Public (1925). (shrink)

To assess the utility of appeals to natural law as a way of projecting ethical claims across ideological and cultural boundaries, three examples of such appeals in just war theory are critically analyzed and evaluated: those of contemporary international lawyers Myres McDougal and Florentino Feliciano, theological ethicist Paul Ramsey, and Franciscus de Victoria, a sixteenth-century Spanish theorist whose recasting of Christian just war thought gave rise to secular international law. The conclusion is that natural-law appeals today can no longer (...) depend on their own self-evidence, but must be attempts to uncover commonality as to what is natural. (shrink)

ABSTRACT Set within the framework of international intellectual history, the present article focusses on the propaganda campaign undertaken by the Company of Scotland to prove the legality of its settlement in the Darien province. It first shows how a group of Scottish authors appropriated sixteenth-century natural law arguments from Spanish sources to reject the claims based on the Bulls of Donation and conquest, which underpinned Spain’s sovereignty over its American territories. Acting individually and collectively, anonymously and under pseudonyms, pro-Darien (...) propagandists instrumentally quoted and restated the contents of major works from Francisco de Vitoria and Bartolomé de Las Casas. Additionally, the Scots also deployed the theories elaborated by Hugo Grotius and Samuel Pufendorf to refute discovery and occupation as further means of acquisition of American lands. In contrast with Spanish expansionism, the Scottish colony eventually grounded its claims on the consent of the indigenous Cuna rulers and on the official treaties recognizing the latter's sovereignty over Darien, emulating the Dutch commercial model of empire and colonial practices. (shrink)

Resumen: La imprecisión lingüística es una de las razones principales por las que es necesario interpretar las disposiciones legales, junto a la percepción de incongruencia entre su significado y la razón práctica que las explica o justifica. Son causas de imprecisión del lenguaje legislativo la vaguedad, la ambigüedad semántica, la ambigüedad pragmática y algunas otras, como la redundancia, la repetición, la infraespecificación, la inconsistencia y las anomalías. Todas ellas están presentes en el artículo 18 de la Ley 40/2015, de 1 (...) de octubre, de Régimen Jurídico del Sector Público. El trabajo analiza la imprecisión lingüística de las leyes con una clasificación de problemas sistemática y tomando este artículo como caso de estudio. Abstract: Linguistic imprecision is one of the main reasons why interpreting statutes is necessary, besides the perception of incongruence between their meaning and the practical reason that explains or justifies them. Causes or imprecision of statutory language are vagueness, semantic ambiguity, pragmatic ambiguity and some others, such as redundancy, repetition, infraspecification, inconsistence and anomalies. All of them are present in section 18 of the Spanish Law 40/2015, of 1 October, of Legal Regime of the Public Sector [Ley de Régimen Jurídico del Sector Público]. The paper analyses the linguistic imprecision of statutes with a systematic and comprehensive classification of problems, and taking that section 18 as a study case. (shrink)

This paper analyzes the implications that the linguistic formulation of the marriage provision of the Spanish Constitution of 1978 had for securing the passage in 2005 of Law 13/2005, which legalized same-sex marriage. By claiming that a semantic omission in the original legal text was a marker of distributiveness, SSM supporters aimed to avoid a constitutional amendment, and succeeded in doing so. This linguistic argument, based on implicitness, was instrumental as a subsidiary argument of political moral argumentation. Linguistic meaning (...) therefore contributed decisively to both the legal meaning of the marriage provision and the content of the law. I argue, against some assumptions in the literature stating otherwise, that linguistic meaning should not be dismissed in constitutional interpretation and adjudication. (shrink)

This article presents a view of bioethics in the Spanish context. We may identify several features common to Mediterranean countries because of their relatively similar social organisation. Each country has its own distinguishing features but we would point two aspects which are of particular interest¨: the Mediterranean view of autonomy and the importance of Catholicism in Mediterranean culture. The Spanish experience on bioethics field has been marked by these elements, trying to build a civic ethics alternative, with the (...) law as an important support. So, Spanish bioethics has been developed in two parallel levels: in the academic and policy maker field (University and Parliament) and in clinical practice (hospitals and healthcare ethics committees), with different paces and methods. One of the most important changes in the paternalistic mentality has been promoted through the recognition by law of the patient’s rights and also through the new generation of citizens, clearly aware on the exercise of autonomy. Now, the healthcare professionals have a new challenge: adapt their practice to this new paradigm. (shrink)

Freedom of Information Acts (FOIA) are valuable legal tools to access information held by public authorities but during the first wave of the Covid-19 pandemic time frames to reply to requests were de jure or de facto suspended in many countries. However, the lack of effective legal tools to achieve transparency was not automatically paired with governmental secrecy. This research paper analyses which are the factors that prompted some governments to move from secrecy to transparency while the essential legal tool (...) to achieve disclosure of information was not available. It focuses on the role of ‘ecologies of transparency’, a concept developed by Seth Kreimer to describe how FOIA needs to be understood as functioning within a collection of factors and actors. Yet, can transparency ecologies still force disclosure of information when FOIA is suspended? Research focuses on a comparative case study about transparency of scientific committees advising governments on Covid-19 in the UK and in Spain. In both countries, members and minutes were initially secret, but the British government published information before being forced by FOIA, while the Spanish executive only released partial information when FOIA was reactivated. The paper argues that information disclosure processes can be understood as supply and demand models. On the demand side, it highlights the role of adversarial press, scientific community, whistle-blowers, the opposition and critics within the governing party as decisive factors within the transparency ecology. On the supply side, it focuses on legitimation needs from the government to explain different outcomes. (shrink)

This paper aims at clarifying some of the most common issues that legal translators have to face when dealing with the translation of private normative texts, such as contracts or wills, which naturally emerge as the consequence and expression of legal or juristic acts in the scope of private law, in Spanish and English. To comprehend the differences and subtleties regarding legal communication between the common law and the continental law countries (specifically the United States and Spain, respectively), we (...) must unveil some essential clues for their translation and application in the global scope of professional interactions, thus creating a process of inter-legal communication, which takes place through the mutual interpretation and application of two, or more, legal traditions. Through the deployment of a generic or pragmatic analysis at textual or discursive and formal or superficial, strata, of two types of genre within the domain of private law (namely wills and tenancy agreements, or leases) this work aims to prove that both the civil law and the common law private instruments are translatable with respect to each other. An important proviso, however, is that their legal traditions and the genres that constitute the communicative tools of their specialised communities must be duly respected and kept in equilibrium, so that one does not overshadow and obliterate the other. Only in that way can the “convergence” of the two traditions truly enrich and strengthen national and international legal culture. (shrink)

Vitoria’s 1537 lecture On the American Indians asserts moral equality and fundamental rights for all humans but is contradicted by the significant inequalities between Spanish conquistadores and indigenous peoples of Mexico and Peru. Despite recognizing these rights, Vitoria’s vision supports an unequal Euro-American relationship regarding territorial sovereignty, self-defense, self-determination, and religious freedom. His insights have implications for contemporary international law concerning indigenous rights. However, his theological framework limits this potential. To better address indigenous issues today, I advocate reframing Vitoria’s (...) perspective by replacing his natural law-based human-rights essentialism with a naturalistic approach that views human rights as social constructs. This shift can help develop international law to prevent violent interactions and promote equality between indigenous and non-indigenous peoples, reducing reliance on nation states to safeguard indigenous rights. Received: 03 August 2023 Accepted: 18 April 2024. (shrink)