Dobro wspólne w demokratycznym państwie prawa

Abstract

The paper discusses one of the most essential categories of modem democracies, i.e. the common good. It is at the top of priority lists of most entities whose aim is to gain influence in a country. The issue of the common good is by no means an easy matter either in theory (i.e. in defining the notion itself and relating it to other categories), or in practice (i.e. in executing it by means of particular entities which inhabit social space). How to serve the common good, how to multiply it in adverse circumstances? Why is thinking in the categories of the common good such a rare thing, even in these institutions which, it might seem, should strive for it hardest? The paper is trying to answer these and other questions referring to a large degree to the experiences of Ernst Wolfgang Bockenforde, philosopher and lawyer, judge of the Constitutional Tribunal in Karlsruhe.