Justice and Freedom

Coordinator: Hugo Cunha Lança
Contact: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

We learn from Ulpiano that Justice is the constant and perpetual will to give each person what is theirs, the jurist being more than a priest, a servant of Justice. And, having it as a premise, it is required that the first concern of the Law hermeneutic is the defence of the most deprived of legal support. Therefore, the protection of children, the defence of the rights of adolescents, the gender issue(s), the respect for the elderly and people with disabilities should be one of the first concerns of the scholars of this area of knowledge. Thus, under this topic, we call for studies that interpret these issues from a multiplicity of perspectives [as if we were dealing with a cubist canvas], namely through the lens of Criminal Law, Family Law, Procedural Law, Sociology and Philosophy of Law, inter alia.

As far as the concept of Freedom is concerned, we must take as a premise its axiological value, observing it in its comprehensive omniscience, in a constant becoming with reality and the new threats, as well as reflecting on freedom as a value of public Law, especially its constitutional protection, in dialogue with the coeval challenges of democracy.

Crucial to the development of this line is the imperative for the Jurist to strip off the arrogance of the jurist and summon other knowledge (sociology, psychology, medicine, biology, etc.) to dialogue and tread paths that, in isolation, are doomed to failure. Not in a view of interdisciplinarity (which often makes us take the cloud for Juno), but in a logic of multidisciplinarity, building solutions on a par with other experiences and perspectives.

Examples of possible themes/research areas in this line of research

• gender issues;
• medically assisted procreation
• euthanasia and the living will
• the protection of children and adolescents
• freedom of contract: traditional types of contract and new types of contract
• freedom of economic initiative and its limits
• constitutional freedoms and their current threats: from big brother to terrorism and covid
• access to the courts and alternative means of dispute resolution;
• the new challenges related to evidence.

Researchers:

Ana Isa Meireles; Ana Loureiro; António Inácio; Bruno Moura; Cátia Monteiro; Carlos Poiares; Edília Rodrigues; Fábio Martins; Fernando Pinto Bronze; Flávio Roques; Gustavo Rozeira; Hugo Cunha Lança; Joana Medeiros; José de Faria Costa; Luís Cabral Moncada; Patrícia Barros; Paulo de Brito; Paulo Sargento; Rita Domingos; Salomão Domingos; Sandra Feitor.