A Tale of Two Hobbes: Brief Remarks (through Turinese eyes) on the Second Chapter of David Dyzenhaus’ The Long Arc of Legality

Abstract

The paper focuses on some relevant features of the chapter The Puzzle of Very Unjust Law II: Hobbes of David Dyzenhaus’ The Long Arc of Legality. Hobbes, Kelsen, Hart (Cambridge University Press, 2022). The essay discusses some of the key points of Dyzenhaus’ fascinating, unorthodox and highly controversial interpretation of Hobbes: namely, the question of «the legal constitution of the Sovereign». By contrasting some elements of Norberto Bobbio’s interpretation of Hobbes with the reading proposed by Dyzenhaus, it is emphasized that the latter does not satisfactorily address (and reconstruct) the radical reformulation of the conceptual apparatus of traditional natural law theory operated  by Hobbes, especially with regard to central concepts such as the notion of “reason”, the framing of natural law and its relation to civil law, and not least the crucial questions of the limits of the sovereign.