The Liberal State and Criminal Law Reform in Spain

Abstract

Throughout the nineteenth century, European legal science experienced a profound transformation, the consequences of which are still relevant today1. It would be a mistake to suppose, however, that all the legal reforms that took place in Europe in the nineteenth century, originated and developed from nothing. The roots of this process of transformation can already be seen in the sixteenth, seventeenth and especially in the eighteenth century, and the course of the European Enlightenment.