Natural Law

The notion of “natural law” is a prime and enduring one in the Western philosophical and political tradition. In antiquity, the doctrine of natural law was based on a conception of nature as a primary ordering force in which every being was ascribed a place. In contemporary times, the doctrine has been reformulated under the guise of “natural rights,” meaning that laws should respect inherent human values. Such a multimillennium history could not but entail major variations over time in the meaning, the purpose, and the place of natural law. For this reason, any comprehensive approach to it must make room for the remarkable permanence of some traits of what is called natural law as well as for dramatic changes in its object and definition.

For the Greeks and then the Romans, who crafted the notion of natural law in a doctrine sometimes referred to as jus naturalism (from the Latin, jus naturale, which means natural law), the concept of law—nomos in Greek and lex in Latin—is grounded in a cosmological perspective according to which the universe is organized on a definite pattern that everyone has to follow. Such a conception extends its reach far beyond the realm of humanity and embraces animals and even the inanimate. In Aristotle's perspective, for instance, the natural place of a stone is the ground where it stays naturally, while in any other place it would fall. Such is the case with human beings. The city is organized through natural ties of subordination and exchanges, and laws should respect nature in the social bonds thus dispatched. The minutiae with which Plato in The Republic or in The Laws and Aristotle in his Politics describe under which conditions—of climate, population, relations between sexes, and so on—a successful city can thrive reflects a general preoccupation. This establishes the good law as the one respecting natural conditions, which range from the demography of a city to the actual ties of subordination between men and women, free citizens and slaves, and classes in society.

Despite pretensions to the contrary, ancient conceptions of natural law did not form an actual coherent body of doctrine. Authors were keen on disputing what was according to nature or against nature; while the principle of natural law was well established, what it tangibly meant was open to continual discussion. There is probably not a single law, rule, or moral obligation of the antique world that has not been submitted to critical scrutiny and challenged or reasserted on the grounds of what is natural or not: The precedence of family duties over city laws (as is the case in the famous Antigone myth, where Antigone refuses to obey her uncle, the local tyrant, who forbade the proper burial of her brother, but also as in Plato's dialogue, Euthyphro, where Socrates critiques a son suing his father for the death of a murderer), the issue of slavery (whether it is natural or not, and under which circumstances, was a constant debate), the question of appropriate leadership (who is the natural leader in a city?), the separation of classes, or what it is proper to do or not do—all these could be subjected to dispute in the name of nature.

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