Ars Iuris Legal Potentials Conference

Constructing Legal Entities: On Persons, Corporations and States

Constructing Legal Entities: On Persons, Corporations and States

The law constructs entities that define our world, and is thereby a powerful force in shaping our reality. While we primarily understand ourselves as human beings, the law rather sees us as subjects of law. And while an extraterrestrial would probably see the USA and Mexico as a connected landmass, we view these as two different legal entities (States) – with a deadly border in between. And who has ever seen a company? Nonetheless, we do not doubt that there are companies as legal actors.

The well-known distinction of personae and res in Roman law is a fundamental part of civil law. While personae are subjects with rights and obligations, res are mere objects, even if they are enslaved humans. There will be no legal claims if there are no legal subjects claiming them against each other. Civil law construes human beings as legal subjects and constitutes groups of people as corporate bodies. International law relies on the assumption of different States as subjects of the law of nations. International and constitutional law play a crucial role in constructing the State as the single most important political body of modernity.

This conference aims to bring together different perspectives on the construction of legal entities, inviting papers exploring this constructive role from doctrinal, comparative, theoretical, or methodological perspectives. Doctrinal contributions may analyse legal norms of subjectivity in areas such as public, private, corporate, or criminal law. Topics of interest also include the making of the State through constitutional identity, the pouvoir constituant, and the reliance on a national “we the people.” Furthermore, subjectivity in international law, including the State as the most important subject, can be discussed.