Studien zur Rechtstheorie – our new publication series

The first volume in the publication series edited by the Max Planck Institute and published by Vittorio Klostermann appeared in 1971. After over 340 volumes and a change of name to “Studien zur europäischen Rechtsgeschichte” in 2002, this revered series is receiving a companion in 2023: “Studien zur Rechtstheorie”. The new series reflects the research on interdisciplinary legal theory being carried out at the Max Planck Institute for Legal History and Legal Theory since 2021, and it will make use of the same proven concept, layout and production quality as the legal historical series. This peer-reviewed series represents an attractive, multilingual forum for excellent monographs and edited volumes from all fields of legal theory.

The inaugural publication in the series is an edition comprising two previously unpublished dissertations of one of the most important European legal philosophers and engaging thinkers of the 20th century: Norberto Bobbio (1909–2004). Known in Germany primarily as a publicist dealing with questions of constitutional law and fundamental problems of political economy, the two theses he wrote at the beginning of his academic career were unknown to the scholarly community and those interested in such topics. Philosophy and Legal Doctrine and Husserl's Phenomenology, both written in the early 1930s, are now available in an annotated edition of the original Italian texts. Edited by Mario G. Losano, who closely worked with Bobbio, the edition includes a comprehensive introduction and useful indexes.