Cardozo Law Review
Abstract
The question of the "purpose" of the state has been a permanent and fundamental problem of all theories of the state ever since Aristotle opened his Politics with the theory of the purpose of the state and placed this sentence at its head: pasa koinonia agathou tivos heneka sunesteken. It was left to the Romantics to contest for the first time the appropriateness of this question and to maintain that the state "just as the plant and the animal" is selfdirected. From that time on, theories have neglected the question of the purpose of the state. They decline to deal with it, alleging that it is a fake problem, or redundant, or unanswerable. And, insofar as the question is recognized as an appropriate one, the theories give answers that are for the most part thoroughly unsatisfactory from a scientific standpoint. In any case, the theory of the state does not find its fundamental problem to be the question of the purpose of the state.
Keywords
International Law, Jurisprudence, Police, Law Enforcement, Social Welfare
Disciplines
International Law | Jurisprudence | Law | Law Enforcement and Corrections | Social Welfare Law
Recommended Citation
Hermann Heller,
The Nature and Structure of the State,
18
Cardozo L. Rev.
1139
(1996).
Available at:
https://larc.cardozo.yu.edu/clr/vol18/iss3/13
Included in
International Law Commons, Jurisprudence Commons, Law Enforcement and Corrections Commons, Social Welfare Law Commons