Diritto e politica nel pensiero di Piero Calamandrei

The PhD thesis focuses on the relationship between law and politics in Piero Calamandrei’s thought, both from the perspective of ius conditum and ius condendum. The thesis is structured in three parts. The first one illustrates the contribution of Calamandrei to the reform of the Code of Civil Procedure, started by the Minister of Justice Dino Grandi in 1939. The reconstruction is based on a remarkable amount of unpublished material and, in particular, on Calamandrei’s manuscript Relazione al Re. The Appendix contains its critical edition, from which significant differences emerge between the manuscript under consideration and the text published in the Gazzetta Ufficiale, as it is shown by the amendments to the text made by the Guardasigilli and by some jurists close to the Fascist regime. The second part of the research work goes back over the complex intellectual ‘itinerary’ of Piero Calamandrei, with specific reference to the principle of legality, in order to highlight the legal and political significance of the judicial review of legislation as a means to check the ‘omnipotence of the legislator’, which was severely criticised by the Florentine jurist. The third part of the thesis focuses on Calamandrei’s commitment to the implementation of the Constitution of the Italian Republic, as well as on the ethics of law and the social responsibility borne by the jurists. His firm critique of positivist formalism offers important hints on today’s ‘legal nihilism’ school of thought.