Abstract

In my Phd thesis, I deal with the juridical and political thought of Christian Wolff, trying to see its connections with his metaphysical and epistemological conception. In fact the idea of systema occupies a very important rule in Wolff’s philosophy, making a separate treatment of practical and theoretical problems impossible. After some biographical notes on the philosopher of Breslau, I deal with his theory of knowledge and his conception of philosophy as a «science of possible». Here I examine the conclusions of the more recent wolffian studies about very debated problems as the relationship between reason and experience, essence and existence, possibility and reality. Secondly, making use of the original texts – particularly of the Institutiones juris naturae et gentium – I analyse the wolffian conception of natural law. I deal with Wolff’s theory of actions, the principle of perfection, the concepts of state of nature, natural obligation, perfect and imperfect right. Nodal point of this analysis is the problem of the relationship between law and moral, resolved by Wolff in the sense of unity (Leibniz) and not of distinction (Thomasius). Thirdly, I examine the wolffian conception of social pact and State, emphasizing the close nexus between Wolff’s political and juridical doctrines. In fact, the fragilities of the state of nature are resolved in the political State, which is seen by Wolff as the main tool of the fulfillment of natural obligations. Here I treat the notions of pactum sociale, imperium publicum, bonum commune and civitas. Wolff’s theory is very detailed. Each concept is connected with the previous one, as imposed by the demonstrative method. The connection between natural law and Aufklärung allows us to see Wolff’s theory under a double perspective: on the one hand as a coherent development of Grotius’ ideas on natural law; on the other hand as a condition – along with the coming of codes – of the birth of legal positivism