Podział władzy państwowej jako przesłanka jej legitymacji
The Division of State Power as a Condition of its Legitimacy

Summary/Abstract: The author begins by presenting the meaning of the concepts of „legitimacy” and „legitimization” of power. The former means the authority of power, respect for it and its acceptance by citizens. The latter is the process aimed at justifying the legitimacy of power. One of the basic premises legitimizing the power of the state in the institutional (legal) terms is the idea of its division. This idea emerged during the English revolution (1640 –1660), giving rise to the relevant concepts and doctrines. These views were later developed, so that by the end of the eighteenth century the theory of separation of powers has been well established. Looking at this theory in the context of legitimizing the state power, we should fi rst point to its guarantee nature in relation to freedoms and rights of the individual. This character was already noticed by the pamphleteers of the English „Great Rebellion” and, then, by such great thinkers as John Locke, Charles de Montesquieu, the America’s Founding Fathers, the authors of the French Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen of 1789, and others. As a normal course of events, this legitimizing nature of the idea of separation of power was sometimes denied. The critics argued that this idea is not compatible with the ideas of sovereignty and democracy. The author polemicizes sharply against these views, claiming that the division of power can be safely classifi ed as rules of „constitutional natural law” or simply acquis constitutionnel, since it is considered a „universal basis for a constitutional democracy.”

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