According to Hägerström, one reason why only dogmatic jurisprudence, of all the various disciplines of legal science, can produce principles of law, while the other fields of legal science cannot, is that the judge, as an office holder, is bound to decide the case before him by applying a given set of rules, namely those rules belonging to the law of the land, but neither bound nor even allowed to decide the case freely, with reference only to ethical, social, economic, and political considerations.515 Hence, jurisprudence is forced to adopt a similar perspective.This set of rules, positive law, consists of two main elements, on the one hand, legislation (statute law), which has practical predominance in modern states, and on the other, customary law, which includes not only customary law proper, but also judicial practice and legal doctrine.516 Consequently, legal knowledge (scientific or other) that does not take the content of positive law as its primary point of departure and the application of the same law as its ultimate goal, will only produce material that due to its essentially nonnormative nature is only of secondary importance to the legal practitioner. (Cf. also Lundstedt’s definition of valid law as being something more than the bare texts of the legal sources.)517 To be more exact, the reason why Hägerström only endows lep a r t v i , c h a p t e r 8 542 8 . 4 doctrine of legal source s : pos i t ive law and val id law 8 . 4 . 1 normat ive unde r standing of val id law 515 Cf. Hägerström, Magistratische Ius, p. 3;“Begreppet viljeförklaring,” pp. 120-128, 135, 138-141, and 150-151; Objektiva rättens begrepp, pp. 16-43; “The Notion of Law,” pp. 74-106; “Kelsen,” p. 36 and 94; “Begreppet Begreppet gällande rätt,” p. 69. 516 Hägerström, Objektiva rättens begrepp, pp. 16-25 and 31-36;“The Notion of Law,” pp. 74-85 and 92-97;“Begreppet viljeförklaring,” pp. 120,124-128,135-140, and150-151; “Declaration of Intention,” pp. 315, 318-324, 327-333, and 343-345;“Kelsen,” pp. 3637 and 94;“Begreppet gällande rätt,” p. 69; Magistratische Ius, p. 3. N.B. according to Hägerström preparatory works and motives do not constitute a separate category of sources, but a subcategory to statute law, since the two are to be used mainly when ascertaining the historical legislator’s intents with a specific legislative product rather than an objective norm. 517 Lundstedt, Rätten och samhället, pp. 50-51 and 66-67.
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