The Character of the Principles of Criminal Law and Criminal Responsibility: Between the Philosophy of Law and Semiotic

Abstract

The article has three basic goals. The first one is to characterize the so-called the principles of criminal liability (or, in other words, the rules of criminal law) as especially significant legal norms (that can be characterized from semiotic point of view), but also certain patterns of determining (the system of) criminal law. The second goal is to characterize the rules as patterns or guidelines, which are a kind of rules constructing the system of criminal law. These rules are also briefly defined from a semiotic perspective. The last part of this article concerns the possible philosophical and political types of determining criminal liability and aims at concluding general theoretical reflections. The article deals primarily with the semiotic and philosophical character of special rules (the so called principles) constructing the criminal law system.