Eugen Ehrlich. Ein Lebensmosaik / Eugen Ehrlich. A Mosaic of Life

No. 2026-05

English Abstract:

The study focuses on the life and intellectual legacy of Eugen Ehrlich, a founder of legal sociology and author of the theory of “living law.” The biographical approach does not attempt to fit his entire life into a uniform narrative context, but rather seeks to depict Ehrlich's life by reconstructing the formative actions, circumstances, and events. Methodologically, the reconstruction is based on the ‘mosaic’ principle, which recognizes and seeks to preserve the heterogeneity and incompleteness of the historical material. The sources are presented in their different “textures” – creating a kind of “life mosaic” in which the main features of Ehrlich's personality and thinking emerge from a historical distance. At the same time, readers are given the opportunity to establish their own interpretative connections.