Humanistic legal sciences: notes for a rescue on fundamental research in law

Abstract

This paper proposes a reflection on fundamental research in law, which, according to Paulo Ferreira da Cunha, has its own name: humanistic legal sciences. In this sense, it addresses a problem identified five decades ago by Francisco Puy in Spain and taken up by Sebastião Cruz and Paulo Ferreira da Cunha in Portugal: the displacement, reduction or exclusion of humanistic legal sciences from the teaching plans of law courses, which has been creating a scenario of “epistemological sterility”. When not excluded, these sciences are attacked or are the object of disregard by many practical lawyers and students, who unthinkingly and blindly reproduce a posture of overvaluing dogmatic-legal knowledge to the detriment of legal-humanistic knowledge. The aim is thus to rescue the role of humanistic legal sciences in legal education, in addition to presenting the main arguments in defence of Puy, Cruz and Ferreira da Cunha.