Foundations of European Legal Culture

Abstract

In my opinion, not only human beings but also creations of the human mind have a right to receive just treatment. My colleague and friend, Friedrich K. Juenger, was the first to suggest that just treatment of Franz Wieacker's essay Voraussetzungen europaischer Rechtskultur requires translation into a language spoken or understood in many parts of the world. I agree fully with him. I am also grateful for his valuable recommendations concerning improvements of my translation. Franz Wieacker is Professor Emeritus of Roman Law, Civil Law, and Private Law History at the University of Gottingen, West Germany. He presented a preliminary version of the paper here translated at the 11th World Congress on Philosophy of Law and Social Philosophy, held at Helsinki in August 1983.* He delivered the final version at an annual meeting of his university, which took place on Ascension Day 1985 in a monastery church at Bursfelde near Gottingen. It was published in a series of pamphlets entitled Bursfelder Universitatsreden. I have translated the lecture into English with the author's permission. I have also prepared a set of footnotes, which comment upon some highly condensed statements and summaries of developments that non-European scholars might not easily understand. Edgar Bodenheimer