of law, legal thought, and legal practice, it is the problems of legal positivism that are of immediate interest. From a practical point of view the analysis of those problems connected to natural law is primarily of historical interest, and in that historical capacity analyses of natural law primarily serve as historical, genetic explanations to why the modern concepts of law have taken their present form. Nevertheless, natural law serves as an excellent didactic example of the adverse effects that an inadequately performed analysis of the fundamentals of one’s scientific premisses can bring about.79 This is especially true if such premisses are not rejected once empirical reality has invalidated them.80 In conclusion, what Hägerström wished to illuminate was the fact that several of the problems of modern legal theory and jurisprudence can be traced back to an insufficient as well as an inadequate implementation of anti-metaphysics in the jurisprudence of the 19th Century. Regardless of whether we discuss natural law or legal positivism (and positive law) these legal theories have several secondary meanings that must be touched upon in order to identify the primary subject of Hägerström’s interest. When analyzing the theoretical home ground of David Nehrman-Ehrenstråle (1695 - 1769), Hägerström defined natural law and positive law primarily as ontological theories of law.That is, theories that primarily address issues such as the origin of law, the authority to create binding law - with accompanying rights and duties - and the doctrine of sources.81 However, he neither addresses the epistemological, logical, and methodological implications that follow on from these theories, nor does he address issues on the validity and implementation of law. If legal theory is to be understood as addressing only ontological issues, then legal theory invariably turns into abstract theory, and loses its practical relevance on account of the fact that the problems that p a r t v, c h a p t e r 2 316 79 Cf., e.g., Hägerström, Selbstdarstellungen, pp. 46-48. 80 See, e.g., Hägerström, “Begreppet viljeförklaring,” pp. 128-129; “Declaration of Intention,” pp. 323-324. 81 Hägerström,“Nehrman-Ehrenstråles uppfattning,” p. 574; Recht, Pflicht etc, pp. 14-15.
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