Ius Novum 4/2020
PROTECTION OF PUBLIC DECENCY IN POLISH CRIMINAL LAW OF THE PRE-PARTITION PERIOD AGAINST CONDUCT CLASSIFIED TODAY UNDER ARTICLE 140 OF THE PETTY OFFENCES CODE K R Z Y S Z T O F WA L A * DOI: 10.26399/iusnovum.v14.4.2020.41/k.wala
1. INTRODUCTION The notion of ‘public decency’ does not easily yield to definition, and yet at the same time, from an a priori perspective, the protection of this particular interest (‘legal good’ in continental parlance) deserves to be met with approval. According to one of the views expressed in the literature, public decency is the set of behavioural patterns, across the various spheres of human life, which a given society approves of and deems desirable, which has been shaped both on the foundation of history and tradition and through the lens of the current socio-economic and cultural situation, and the compliance with which serves the purpose of making sure society can function properly, while failure to comply implies a negative societal reaction to individual conduct.1 In this approach, the correct understanding of the notion of ‘public decency’ should also reflect the historical dimension, which results from one of the characteristics of this protected interest, i.e. its historical variability. Public decency within the meaning of the Polish Petty Offences Code is currently
* PhD, Criminal Law and Criminology Department at the Faculty of Law and Administration of Maria Curie-Skłodowska University in Lublin; e-mail: krzysztof.wala@poczta.umcs.lublin.pl; ORCID: 0000-0002-9773-3926 1 K. Wala, Wykroczenie nieobyczajnego wybryku na tle pozostałych wykroczeń przeciwko obyczajności publicznej, Warszawa 2019, pp. 78–79.
