Spontaneous orders in the theory of the dominium of the Spanish Scholasticism

Abstract

This paper argues how the principle of spontaneous order, which according to Hayek and the Austrian School of Economics is at the origin of the fundamental institutions that regulate human coexistence, is already found in the reflection on the ius gentium of Spanish scholasticism. Under this legal category, the scholastic doctors elaborate, as a plausible conjecture, a historical-genetic theory on the origins of dominion in its forms of property and government, which serves both to explain its origin and to allege its legitimacy. As an illustration of what has been said, firstly, the theory on the origin of property that Francisco de Vitoria sets forth when commenting on Aquinas' Summa Theologica is presented, and secondly, the political theory of the double pact of Francisco Suárez. The continuity of arguments, and above all methodological, of Locke's political and legal theory with respect to Suárez's is also shown.