The paper aims to show that the Polish Environmental Law is an act that imposes
public imposts to protect Poland’s natural environment. This act features certain
specific qualities and legal solutions. The author has formulated a claim that some
of the provisions concerning the fees for the use of the natural environment and
the emissions surcharge breach the constitutional standards of exclusivity of an
impost act, of the right to predictable taxation, decent legislation, and a democratic
state of law.

The paper deals with the issue of the legal consequences of a false statement given
by the accused in criminal proceedings. The author presents positions expressed in this matter in the literature and jurisprudence. He then presents and justifies his own view. He believes that a false statement by the accused is not criminally prohibited, because there is no such type of offence. However, such behaviour is unlawful. It is true that this is a kind of defence, but it is not the execution of the right to defence. Nevertheless, it does not appear that the false statement could result in an intensification of the penalty or in the use of a preventive measure in the proceedings (for example temporary custody). It is undoubted, however, that false statement resulting in defamation or false accusation may lead to criminal liability.

The provisions of general tax law contained in the tax ordinance should be stable. In recent years, however, an increasing process of amendment to this law can be seen. An analysis of the changes made indicates that they are introduced in connection with the need to counteract tax fraud, the lack of institutions characteristic of modern acts of this type and the development of new technologies. Continuous modernization of the provisions of over 20 years of ordinance no longer brings the expected results, and in some cases leads to the spoilage of basic institutions of tax law. A new law is needed. Only its adoption can contribute to improving the stability of general tax law.

The article concerns real and potential reactions of jurisprudential discourses to the phenomenon of the crisis of liberal democracy. The author argues that liberal democracy has been a hegemonic structure – meaning that not only has it been dominant in the factual sense in the broadly understood Western legal and political culture but it has also effectively suppressed any competing discourses. Today, the hegemony of demoliberalism is being questioned. The new state of affairs causes a range of complications that
jurisprudential discourses have to deal with. The author considers three possible scenarios of the reaction of these discourses to the said crisis. The first of them means a shift towards democratic authoritarianism. The second is about remaining in a collective hypocrisy, waiting for a change in the current intellectual climate. The third involves accepting the political nature of jurisprudence and making the concept of agonistic democracy a reality.

In the article, I contrast the contemporary legal dogma with the challenges underlying the political nature of law and judicial practice. Both the Continental jurisprudence and the judicial decisions issued by European courts are dominated by the dogmatic current – and treated as politically neutral acts. My intention is to carefully verify this quite common belief in this paper. Making use of H. Berman’s views, I assume that the present shape of jurisprudence and the judicial practice based thereon have been established as a result of political conflicts and that the legal dogma is capable of neutralising and solving modern-day political conflicts precisely because of the qualities of the said shape. It is therefore both a political and an apolitical activity. But this paradox is only apparent. In its strive to keep its paradigm alive, the dogma should be flexible in reacting to the challenges occurring in its political environment. It can – and should – modify the “buffer” of the theory upon which it is set in order to retain its core. In the article, I try to answer the question about the boundaries of the possible adaptation of jurisprudence and juridical practice with respect to claims raised by the domain of politics – claims currently articulated as the strongest by the so-called critical theories of adjudication. The final part of the paper is an attempt – based on the example of theses formulated in monograph
by R. Mańko, W stronę krytycznej filozofii orzekania – to outline the said boundaries.

Theoretical foundations of the animal protection law remain in statu nascendi. The lack of an established dogmatic systematization of this domain makes studies focused primarily on a comprehensive discussion of its practical aspects, also contributing to the development of theoretical and dogmatic bases of reasoning aiming to solve the practical issues of animal law. For this reason, the Animal Rights. Practical Guide by Karolina Kuszlewicz is a particularly valuable book. The author addresses various problems of the legal protection of animals in a competent and interesting manner.
Many of her interventions inspire further inquiries or critical comments. At the same time, the book illustrates how the dialogue between theoretical concepts and challenges of legal practice can co-create animal law as an emerging branch of the legal system together with an accompanying realm of jurisprudential research.

The legislative changes that take place in the area of higher education and science pose new challenges to higher education institutions and create a new framework of verification of their teaching and research activity. Among the many significantly changing aspects of functioning of the system of higher education and science, the definition of the mission of this system seems to be particularly interesting. The new Higher Education and Science Law Act imposes important regulations in this domain. Defining the mission of the system of higher education and science
refers directly to the values lying at the heart of the activity of institutions of higher education and science, including universities in particular. A defined mission of a university ensures a reference to the tradition and the position of this university in the social system, characterises its identity, and indicates the values the university protects and promotes in its activity. Also, a defined mission statement points to a university’s main goals set on the future and the environment in which it
functions. In this area, defining the mission is also one of the instruments used to manage a university.

Authority – even though the title of this paper may suggest so – is not a phenomenon opposing culture. It is actually a product of culture or, as sometimes said, of the achievements of civilisation. Since authority is a product of culture, it may not be treated as a phenomenon isolated from it, without any ties with cultural patterns, which may – as a result – act as determinants of the institutional and functional qualities of authority. Culture and its products (including knowledge, law, religion, morality, etc.), like other social phenomena, can become factors stimulating the exercise of authority, or act as factors to stabilise or curb this exercise within the framework of the patterns (norms) it has created. Societies make constant choices in terms of adopting, modifying, and rejecting various cultural patterns.

One of the consequences of the post-1989 significant legislative activity of the Sejm of the Republic of Poland is the fact that legal acts that play a special role in the legal system (codes) are also subject to numerous amendments. What is the influence of such amendments on the cohesion and transparency of the legal regulations included in these codes? Was the intention to fulfil the demands of the business trading of the time, undoubtedly deserving of approval, by modernising the existing regulations, introducing new ones, and – potentially – abandoning those whose practical significance and application is currently marginal in the context of the discussed matter an essential motive for undertaking many legislative changes applied to the Civil Code regarding the legal regulations of economic relations – including in particular the legal regulations of the specific part of commercial contracts law – after the transformation of the socio-economic system in the years 1989–1990? Is it therefore possible to say with respect to the present shape of the specific part of commercial contracts law in the Civil Code that this is in an optimal state? Or perhaps there is an excessive or insufficient number of legal regulations in this matter? Are there any draft amendments to the said area of legal regulations? What directions do they follow? The subject matter of this paper is to search for answers
to the questions asked above.

Even though the proportionality principle is well-established for judicial review in matters pertaining to human rights in modern constitutional law in numerous jurisdictions, it has recently become subject to a growing tide of criticism. The article aims to describe and critically analyze the main arguments raised by the opponents of using proportionality as the tool for adjudicating conflicts of fundamental rights. After briefly describing the typical and the most common structure of the proportionality test as it is used in constitutional law, the author would present – and then dismiss – the three most significant allegations towards the proportionality analysis, namely: the problem of incommensurability, the alleged proportionality’s moral neutrality as well as the scope of judicial discretion that is claimed to be too wide according to some of proportionality’s opponents.

This paper reviews the work of Cass R. Sunstein who is a renowned and widely quoted legal scholar and a very prolific writer on a wide range of subjects. I outline herein some themes and ideas expressed in over a dozen C.R. Sunstein’s books that were published between 1993 and 2017. As the title suggests, an emphasis is placed on issues of constitutional relevance. Aiming to place Sunstein’s body of work within a larger context I trace a considerable shift in his approach to political problems and challenges from a purely legal to a more nuanced and multi-dimensional one. Accordingly I present Sunstein’s views on such issues as the partiality of constitutions, incompletely theorized agreements, judicial minimalism, the ideological component of judging, the cost of rights, and group polarization. The works of this contemporary Publius show that pursuing constitutional law in a practical way is much more than study in linguistics or compiling a constitutional court’s decisions. Cass R. Sunstein’s extensive oeuvre provides a rich material for devising new constitutional solutions to real social problems.