The Hierarchy of Legal Values: Doctrinal Approaches and Contours of Systematization

The paper argues that the legal system rests on a structured hierarchy of values that orients adjudication and lawful behavior. It surveys principal doctrinal approaches to legal values, emphasizing their historical contingency and dependence on prevailing theories of law and legal culture, including the domestic emphasis on state-centered values. A concise and workable taxonomy is proposed along the architecture of law: core system-level values (law, branch, institution, legal principles, statute, legality, legal order, stability, effectiveness) are distinguished from derivative sector-specific values across public and private law. The analysis stresses that ranking of values shifts in transformative periods and must be assessed within a unified socio-cultural framework in which the person, life, liberty, equality, justice, peace, and the rising value of security remain reference points; the resilience of the hierarchy turns on the quality of state–society dialogue and constitutional governance.