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Reviewed by:
  • Compendio di diritto amministrativo canonico by Jorge Miras, Javier Canosa and Eduardo Baura
  • William L. Daniel, Judge, Vice-Chancellor
Compendio di diritto amministrativo canonico, Subsidia Canonica 4, by Jorge Miras, Javier Canosa and Eduardo Baura. Rome: Editore Università della Santa Croce, 2007. Pp. 1-408.

This compendium, the newest addition to an Italian series of pedagogical manuals, is a translation by Alberto Perlasca of a Spanish book published out of the faculty of canon law at the University of Navarre. While it describes itself as a translation of the first of two Spanish editions (1st ed., 2001; 2nd ed., 2005), one of the authors informed this reviewer that it can be considered a veritable third edition since it has benefitted from some corrections and has been updated with references to recently issued documentation from the Apostolic See.

Consolidating and developing the work of Javier Hervada, Pedro Lombardía and Eduardo Labandeira, the authors successfully synthesize the principal achievements of administrative-canonical legislation and scientific research. They identify administrative authorities and examine the juridic acts proper to them, giving suitable attention to legal remedies against illegitimate or inopportune acts.

The book is divided into ten lessons (lezioni), each dealing with a particular area of administrative law in the canonical system. The ten areas are the following: 1) the notions of the public administration and of administrative law, 2) the submission of the public administration to the principle of legality, 3) the administration's legal capacity to create norms, 4) the administration's ability to enter into agreements and to impose penalties, 5) the notion of a singular administrative act, 6) the efficacy (e.g., execution) and inefficacy (e.g., invalidity) of such an act, 7) the nature of the singular decree and the rescript, 8) the content of rescripts (i.e., favors, privileges and dispensations), 9) hierarchical recourse, and 10) contentious-administrative recourse before the Supreme Tribunal of the Apostolic Signatura.

For the insight of the reader, the principles mentioned are frequently illustrated with the jurisprudence and praxis of the Roman Curia. Especially welcome are the summaries of causes adjudicated before the second section of the Apostolic Signatura. By including these elements the authors highlight the necessary complementarity between canonical doctrine and jurisprudence.

Given the plenitude of references to canons and other normative sources—and despite the fact that this may depart from the manual style of [End Page 693] the book—it would have been useful for research purposes to include an index of canons cited, and we recommended this for a future edition. Still, the reader is aided by the detailed table of contents, the bibliographies, and the glossary of key terms.

Since this volume is intended especially for the use of students at the licentiate level of canonical studies, it does not dwell on disputed questions in canonical doctrine, though passing reference is occasionally made to these. Students comfortable reading Italian would be rewarded were they to include this book in their personal library. It is a convenient reference tool for encapsulating basic, peacefully-accepted notions. This reviewer therefore highly recommends it to all canonists since it furnishes an extensive treatment of the general norms of canon law, especially those concerning the exercise of executive power, which constitutes much of the daily activity of ecclesiastical governance.

William L. Daniel, Judge, Vice-Chancellor
Diocese of Winona
Winona, MN
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