Sebastian Schwab

About

Sebastian Schwab studied law in Göttingen and Berlin (HU). There, he worked as a student assistant to Professor Hans Michael Heinig and Professor Christoph Möllers. He interrupted his studies for a practical semester at the Brussels office of the Plenipotentiary of the Council of the EKD to the Federal Republic of Germany and the European Union. From November 2018 to July 2019, Sebastian was a researcher at Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer LLP (Berlin) in the practice group Environment, Planning, Regulatory (Public Commercial Law).

During his studies and doctorate, he was and is supported by a scholarship from the German National Academic Foundation. For his First Legal State Examination he was awarded the Prize by the Ministry of Justice of Lower Saxony. In March 2022, Sebastian was a visiting researcher at the Max Planck Institute for Legal History and Legal Theory. In the winter term 2022/23, he will be a visiting scholar at the Hans Kelsen Institute in Vienna and at the University of Oxford. The latter stay is made possible by the Adam von Trott Bursary, awarded by Mansfield College in coöperation with Göttingen University and the Adam von Trott foundation.

His research focuses on constitutional law, legal theory and the theory of democracy, the methodological reflection of legal historians’ work, and Protestant church law.

PhD Topic

I research(ed) from the perspective of legal theory and constitutional law, why and with which legitimacy legal arguments draw on history. Is – like legal methodology often supposes – this kind of argumentation outstandingly “democratic”? What says a historical argument about the lawyer who invokes it? Which images of the past – and of the law – are transported through them? These are the questions that my research asks and (hopefully) answers. My theses can inform argumentative and methodological practice. Making the implicit explicit, is of high value for those who argue: Theory of History influences the image of the past; with another set of theory, the image changes. Methods have a huge effect on the outcome. However, methods do so by marking common ground. When this common ground crumbles, the outcome alters. My goal is not to propagate an “anything goes” attitude but developing a skeptical approach towards exaggerated suggestions of legal epistemology.

This is no l’art pour l’art thing. On a societal level, we are currently experiencing that the relevance of historic imprint is not anymore deemed self-evident. We can notice that past injustices are not only unrecognized but actively and vigorously contested. The arena of these battles is, in a democratic state, always also the law: Since the law arguments aim at is our law, and the history at stake is our history.

Publications (selection)

Vom Nutzen und Nachteil der kirchlichen Zeitgeschichte für die evangelische Kirchenrechtswissenschaft, in: Th. Brechenmacher/F. Kleinehagenbrock/C. Lepp/H. Oelke (Hg.): Kirchliche Zeitgeschichte. Bilanz - Fragen - Perspektiven, 2021, S. 233-251

Visitation und Governance, in: ZevKR 66 (2021), 178–197

Historische Ambiguität und Recht. Zur Frage der Ausgleichsleistungen für die "Hohenzollern" und der Stellung historischen Wissens im Prozessrecht, in: JZ 2021, 500–508

Demokratischer Staat und Wandel. Regulierungsrecht als Projekt einer aporetischen Demokratie, in: R. Greve/J. Moir et al. (Hg.), Der digitalisierte Staat. 60. Assistententagung Öffentliches Recht, 2020, S. 39–61

Die Wiederaufnahme des akademischen Betriebs an der Göttinger Juristischen Fakultät nach 1945 bis ca. 1949, in: ZRG GA 137 (2020), 469–492

Das Kriterium der Existenzgefährdung im verwaltungsgerichtlichen Eilrechtsschutz, in: NVwZ 2020, 689–692

A complete list of publications and lectures can be found here.