Law in the Making: A Comparative Survey

The primary objective of the studies reported in this volume is the analysis of the legislative process in parliamentary and other Western countries and in the European Community, in order to elaborate on fundamental categories. Also reported is a study of the application of information technology in legislative activities. In particular, the main aim of this research is to evaluate the relations between the sources of law systems operating in the various legal systems and the corresponding forms of government and to establish to what extent legislative techniques depend on the form of government in a given country, and vice-versa. All the studies are developed using comparative methods, take into account data concerning various countries and are based on separate analyses of each by the respective national legal scholars.

The present volume presents a part of the results of a research project launched by the European Science Foundation (ESF) in 1977. Tribute should be paid to the late Professor Aleck Chloros, Judge in the Court of the European Community, whose belief in the European ideal and enthusiasm for European cooperation and the comparative study of legal problems made him an elo- quent advocate of a large-scale ESF venture into the field of com- parative law. Judge Chloros had envisaged the creation of a per- manent, sizable and well-equipped European institute for compa- rative legal studies. The successive working parties convoked by the Executive Council of the ESF, which I had the honour of chairing from the beginning, came to the conclusion that this am- bitious vision could not be realized immediately; the financial sit- uation of the member organizations of the ESF also deteriorated, making a cautious approach a necessary virtue. The solution ulti- mately adopted by the last of the working parties - the Ad Hoc Committee for Comparative Law -and submitted to the General Assembly of the ESF in 1979 called for the launching of four pi- lot projects. In November 1980, the Assembly approved detailed plans for two of these projects. The first of these - dealing with medical responsibility - has already been presented in an impres- sive volume (E. Deutsch and H. -L. Schreiber, editors, Medical Responsibility in Western Europe.

Contents: The Law-Making Process as a Juridical and Political Activity.- Constitutional Systems and Sources of Law.- Constitutional Law between Statutory Law and Higher Law.- Statute and Statutory Instrument in the Evolution of European Constitutional Systems.- Constitutional Jurisdiction as Law-Making.- Collective Bargaining as Agreement and as Law: Neo-Contractualist and Neo-Corporative Tendencies of our Age.- Central Law and Peripheral Law.- The Law-Making Process in the European Communities.- Problems of the Legislative Process in the Socialist Countries of Europe.- Some Specific Elements Concerning the Legislative Process of the S.F.R. of Yugoslavia.- Software for the Legislator.- Annex I: How the Research was Carried out.- Annex II: Guidelines for National Reporters.- Subject Index.