1991 Reports

The Rule of Law and the Law-Based State (Rechtsstaat) (with special reference to developments in the Soviet Union)

Berman, Harold J.

The expression “law-based state” (in German, Rechtsstaat; in Russian, pravovoe gosudarstvo), which since 1988 has been one of the principal slogans of the Gorbachev Administration, is often mistranslated in English as “rule of law” or “state based on the rule of law.”! In this essay I shall explore the theoretical implications of the expressions “rule of law” and “law-based state” in the context of their historical origins and shall examine ways in which both concepts are reflected in recent Soviet legal thought.