Alfred Verdross

Alfred Verdross (also Alfred Verdroß-Droßberg ; * February 22, 1890 in Innsbruck , Tyrol ; † April 27, 1980 ibid) was an Austrian diplomat and university professor at the University of Vienna . He is considered the most important Austrian international lawyer of the 20th century.

Life

Coat of arms of Droßberg, awarded in 1911.

Alfred Verdross was the son of Ignaz Verdroß von Droßberg , an emperor general of the Austro-Hungarian army who was ennobled in 1911. He was a teacher of international law, a writer and a legal philosopher. Initially a diplomat, from 1922 Verdross was a professor at the Consular Academy , from 1924 to 1960 a university professor at the University of Vienna and from 1958 to 1977 a judge at the European Court of Human Rights . He was also a member of the International Law Commission and the Institut de Droit international .

Together with Adolf Julius Merkl , Verdross was a student of Hans Kelsen . Characterized by the coherence of the pure legal doctrine , he made the same for the relationship between international law and state law (cf. inter alia “The unity of the legal world view based on the international law constitution”, 1923) as well as the understanding of the international community (cf. inter alia “The constitution der Völkerrechtsgemeinschaft ”, 1926) fruitful.

However, Verdross turned away from Kelsen's right-wing positivism at an early stage and renewed the classic Christian-Catholic doctrine of international law on the basis of the approaches of the School of Salamanca ( Francisco de Vitoria , Francisco Suárez ), which was also based on Hugo Grotius and the entire Protestant doctrine of natural law of the 17th and 18th centuries Century ( Johannes Althusius , Samuel Pufendorf , Christian Wolff ) was of great influence (cf. Ernst Reibstein, Johannes Althusius as a continuation of the school of Salamanca. Studies on the history of ideas of the constitutional state and the ancient Protestant doctrine of natural law , 1955). In his legal philosophy he tied in with the common good of the state in Augustine of Hippo and Thomas Aquinas .

Verdross, who founded the Viennese school of international law and legal philosophy, which was shaped by natural law, was able, through his stupendous knowledge of positive law, to shape it into a closed system on the basis of his legal-philosophical approaches, which found its support in state practice. The development of the international community after the Second World War shows in many aspects natural law value thinking, especially in the idea of ​​the fair distribution of the goods of this world (cf. e.g. the “ New International Economic Order” proclaimed by the UN General Assembly in 1974 ), but also found its unspoken expression in the development of the doctrine of the basic rights and basic duties of states and in much more. This confirms the idea formulated by Verdross of expanding the classic concept of the bonum commune , i.e. the concept of the common good developed in connection with the state, to bonum commune humanitatis , the world common good .

Awards

• 1953: Honorary membership of the American Society for International Law
• 1958: Grand Cross of the Papal Order of Knights of St. Gregory the Great
• 1959: Austrian Decoration of Honor for Science and Art
• 1960: Ring of Honor of the City of Vienna
• 1961: Honorary doctorate from the University of Vienna
• 1967: Honorary doctorate from the University of Salzburg
• 1967: Prize of the City of Vienna for the humanities
• 1974: Cardinal Innitzer Prize
• 1975: International Antonio Feltrinelli Prize
• 1977: Grand Cross of the Civil Order of Alfonso X the Wise
• 1980: Large gold medal with the star for services to the Republic of Austria

literature

• Herbert Miehsler among others: Festschrift for the 90th birthday. 1980.
• Heribert Franz Köck : Life and work of the Austrian legal scholar Alfred Verdross. In: ZöR. Vol. 42, 1991, p. 31 ff.
• Heribert Franz Köck: Alfred Verdross - An Austrian legal scholar of international importance. Series of publications by the Lower Austrian Legal Society, Vol. 56, 1991.
• Heribert Franz Köck: Vita ed opera del giurista austriaco Alfred Verdross. In: Roman historical communications. Vol. 34/35, 1992/93, p. 299 ff.
• Herbert Schambeck : Alfred Verdross as a legal philosopher and the Viennese school of legal theory. In: Peter Fischer u. a. (Ed.): The world in the field of tension between regionalization and globalization. Festschrift for Heribert Franz Köck, Vienna 2009, ISBN 978-3-7073-1165-5 , pp. 527-542.
• Jürgen Busch, Irmgard Marboe, Gerhard Luf: Alfred Verdross - A man of contradiction? In: Franz-Stefan Meissel, Thomas Olechowski , Ilse Reiter-Zatloukal, Stefan Schima (eds.): Displaced law - displacing law. On the history of the Vienna law and political science faculty between 1938 and 1945 (=  Juridicum Spotlight . Volume 2 ). Manz , Vienna 2012, ISBN 978-3-214-07405-0 , pp. 139-202 .
• Bruno Simma : Alfred Verdross (1890–1980). In: Peter Häberle , Michael Kilian , Heinrich Amadeus Wolff (ed.): Constitutional law teacher of the 20th century. Germany, Austria, Switzerland. 2nd edition, De Gruyter, Berlin a. a. 2018, ISBN 978-3-11-054145-8 , pp. 417-428.

Web links

• Literature by and about Alfred Verdross in the catalog of the German National Library
• Alfred Verdroß-Droßberg in the Vienna History Wiki of the City of Vienna
• Obituary for Alfred Verdross in the Ö1 lunch journal of April 28, 1980 in the online archive of the Austrian Media Library

Individual evidence

1. ↑ AAS 51 (1959), n.5, p. 285.
2. ↑ Ministerio de Educación y Ciencia : Real Decreto 1441/1977, de 23 de junio, por el que se concede la Gran Cruz de la Orden Civil de Alfonso X el Sabio a los señores que se relacionan . In: Boletín Oficial del Estado . No. 150, June 24, 1977, ISSN  0212-033X , p. 14215.