LAUSR

Abstract This paper examines the excellent Hungarian legal philosopher, Felix Somlo’s theories on the state and politics. It claims that Somlo had three theories of state. The first could be reconstructed from the sociological allusions and hints of his first book, titled Allami beavatkozas es individualismus [State intervention and individualism] (1903). His second theory of state was based on legal concepts exposes in a Neo-Kantian fashion, and it has been explicated in his Juristische Grundlehre [Basic Legal Concepts and Ideas] (1917). His third theory of state is an unfinished theory prepared in his unpublished Allambolcseleti jegyzetek [Notes for a Philosophy of State] (1919/20). The core idea of the first theory is regulation (which was considered by Somlo as interference); the central concept of the second theory is the so called ‘Rechtsmacht’ [legal might], which was coined by Somlo; whereas the third theory revolves around the possibility of so called eternal truth of history of ideas.