Legal science is one of the main components in the civil law tradition (after Roman law, canon law, commercial law, and the legacy of the revolutionary period).
Legal science is primarily the creation of German legal scholars of the middle and late nineteenth century, and it evolved naturally out of the ideas of Friedrich Carl von Savigny. Savigny argued that German codification should not follow the rationalist and secular natural law thinking that characterized the French codification but should be based on the principles of law that had historically been in force in Germany.It is referred to as "Rechtswissenschaften" (plural) or "Rechtswissenschaft" (singular) in German.First, some traditional concepts of ‘legal science’ will be analysed, and a definition of ‘legal science ampio sensu’, ‘legal science stricto sensu’ and ‘legal dogmatics’ will be proposed. Second, a reconstruction of five models of ‘legal science ampio sensu’ will be presented to show the different methodological alternatives available to legal scholars. Third, I claim that it is necessary (for conceptual reasons) to argue for moral reasons when choosing a legal method. Finally, I offer some arguments for supporting the five methodological alternatives of legal science ampio sensu.Modern jurisprudence embodies two distinct traditions of thought about the nature of law. The first adopts a scientific approach which assumes that all legal phenomena possess universal characteristics that may be used in the analysis of any type of legal system. The main task of the legal philosopher is to disclose and understand such characteristics,which are thought to be capable of establishment independently of any moral or political values which the law might promote, and of any other context-dependent features of legal systems. Another form of jurisprudential reflection views the law as a complex form of moral arrangement which can only be analysed from within a system of reflective moral and political practices.Rather than conducting a search for neutral standpoints or criteria, this second form of theorising suggests that we uncover the nature and purpose of the law by reflecting on the dynamic properties of legal practice.