Rafael Altamira y Adolfo Posada: Dos aportaciones a la socialización del derecho y su proyección en Latinoamérica

Abstract

The aim of this paper is to outline the great transformation undergone by the law during the first half of the 20th century, which basically consisted of a double process of socialization and internationalization. Legal antiformalism, legal sociological thought, private international law and comparative law played an important role in these transformations, especially if we consider the extensive phenomena of legal transplants and the transfer of legal ideas. Here we try to examine this process through the contributions of two Spanish scholars, Adolfo Posada y Rafael Altamira, who were working on a social approach to law and travelled to Latin America on several occasions. They tried to establish an enduring relationship with the former Spanish colonies and to work on a common cultural Hispano-American unity, so that a legal unification between the Hispanic peoples on both sides of the Atlantic Ocean might be achieved.