In the field of Law, legal norms have a hierarchy . This is a general principle that is present in the legal systems of most countries. In this sense, Kelsen’s pyramid allows us to understand the hierarchical ordering of the legal system . Kelsen
in the legal field
Hans Kelsen (1881-1973) was a lawyer, jurist and philosopher born in the present-day Czech Republic and professionally developed his career in Austria, Germany, Switzerland and the United States. He entered the history of the legal world through his work “Pure Theory of Law”, by his appointment as a judge at the Court of The Hague and by Kelsen’s pyramid. From the point of view of the philosophy of law, he is considered a defender of juspositivism. kelsen’s pyramid
With his pyramid he intended to explain the legal norms within any territory. Thus, on the normative cusp there is normally a constitutional text or Magna Carta, from which all the remaining laws emanate.
At a lower level are organic laws and then ordinary laws (the former are more difficult to revoke than the latter).
On a lower scale, we can find other types of laws, such as decree law. At the base of the pyramid are normative regulations.
The principle of hierarchy is implicit in Kelsen’s model
The pyramidal legal system described by Kelsen is based on the principle of the hierarchy of norms. In other words, norms of a lower rank cannot contradict those of a higher rank. This means that one norm always prevails over another.
The hierarchical principle serves, in turn, as a criterion to resolve any possible contradiction or conflict between laws. Thus, if a rule of a lower category opposes or contradicts one of a higher category, the former has no legal validity. In this sense, in many nations there is a constitutional court whose mission is to interpret the legal validity of lower category norms within a territory. kelsen’s pyramid
The geometric figure of the pyramid as a metaphor
The pyramid is a geometric figure that serves as an explanatory metaphor to refer to any reality in which there is some gradual or staggered scheme . Thus, there is the Maslow pyramid in Psychology, the pyramid sales model and the food pyramid. All of them are governed by a gradual type scheme where the higher elements take the lower ones implicitly. Kelsen
