HUGO GROTIUS AND THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE NA TURAL LA W THEORIES

Abstract

Article traces the beginnings of natural law theories in Aristotle and Roman lawyers and then outlines their development from Aquinas to late scholastics and Suarez. However, author asserts that the true origins and conceptual sources of modern natural law theories are to be found in the early scholastic of 12th century, after the introduction of canon law and its early development. He also examines the critique of natural law in the age of Renaissance, exploring then Hugo Grotius's natural law theory, defining its historical novum and outlining its conceptual field, the result of the transformation of humanist arguments, that lays the foundations of liberal doctrine and the theory of sovereign state and on which Selden, Hobbes, Pufendorf, Barbeyrac and Locke have built their modern natural law theories.