Virtue, Justice, and Law

Authors

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.12662/2447-6641oj.v24i45.5677.pe5677.2026

Keywords:

virtue, justice, law, private law, Aristotle

Abstract

Context: The contemporary separation between law and justice contrasts with a long tradition that conceived a close link between them; against this background, the paper revisits Book V of Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics, a foundational work of Western moral philosophy, to rethink legal categories through justice understood as a virtue.

Objectives: To restate for legal theory and practice Aristotle’s core distinctions –general vs. particular justice, and, within particular justice, distributive vs. corrective justice – and to highlight their immediate usefulness, including a clearer account of when and how inequalities between parties (e.g., in consumer relations) must matter.

Method: Theoretical and bibliographical research combined with conceptual reconstruction: the paper systematizes Book V’s categories, places them in an intellectual–historical trajectory (from ancient moral philosophy to legal traditions) and relates them to contemporary legal problems.

Results: The study clarifies the content and scope of the main categories (virtue; general/particular justice; distributive/corrective justice; voluntary/involuntary corrective justice), showing how they can refine criteria of equality/inequality in legal relations and guide the identification of injustices in exchanges and distributions.

Conclusions: A careful grasp of Aristotle’s distinctions yields practical gains for contemporary legal reasoning—especially in deciding when and how party asymmetries should be taken into account—while warning against overly stylized or instrumental readings of Aristotle.

Author Biography

Osny da Silva Filho, FGV Direito SP

Professor Associado da FGV Direito SP. Leciona e orienta nas áreas de Direito dos Contratos, Direito do Consumidor, Direito do Mercado Financeiro, Propriedade Intelectual, Direito Imobiliário, Direito Notarial, Direito e Tecnologia e Teoria do Direito. Doutor, mestre e bacharel em direito pela USP. Doutorado sanduíche na Faculdade de Direito de Harvard. Pesquisador visitante no Max-Planck-Institut de Hamburgo, na Universidade da Califórnia em Berkeley, na Universidade de Roma La Sapienza e na Universidade de Roma Tor Vergata. São Paulo, SP, BR. 

EM ABERTO

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Published

2026-04-30

How to Cite

SILVA FILHO, Osny da. Virtue, Justice, and Law. Revista Opinião Jurídica (Fortaleza), Fortaleza, v. 24, n. 45, p. e5677, 2026. DOI: 10.12662/2447-6641oj.v24i45.5677.pe5677.2026. Disponível em: https://unichristus.emnuvens.com.br/opiniaojuridica/article/view/5677. Acesso em: 27 aug. 2026.

Issue

Vol. 24 No. 45 (2026): EM ABERTO

Section

Artigos Originais

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Copyright (c) 2026 Osny da Silva Filho

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