Other Phases of Legal Pluralism in the Contemporary World

Since the discovery of the dual structure of state law and minor law in non-Western countries, the scope of the inquiry into legal pluralism has been expanding gradually. This article attempts to prompt this inquiry by identifying hitherto neglected phases of legal pluralism working in the contemporary world. After discussing various kinds of legal pluralism, other types of legal pluralism are suggested for verification by interested scholars, such as legal pluralism in conflict, legal pluralism in subjectivity, a conceptual scheme and an operational definition of legal pluralism.     

反思法治文化：标准、困境与路径

如果说权力的配置是法治的核心,那么对权力具有深远影响的法律文化也在以＂看不见的传承＂方式影响中国法治格局。法律文化多元是一种现实存在,而法治文化的标准则为这样的存在设定了目标。中国历史上铸就的人治传统、礼法文化、法律工具化形成的传统法律文化形成了法治文化构建的传统障碍;对传统资源的过分批判和抛弃及社会信仰危机弥漫社会无形中扮演了法治文化构建的现实困境：面对传统障碍和现实困境,法治文化路径选择从社会主体意识整合的视角出发,即从文化多元、法治意识及社会主体意识方面探究中国法治文化建设的出路。     

Access to justice and human rights in Afghanistan

In anthropological and legal literature, the phenomenon termed ‘legal pluralism’ has been interpreted as a co-presence of legal orders which act in relation to their own ‘levels’ of referring ‘fields’. The Afghan normative network is generally described in terms of pluralism, where different normative systems such as customs, shari’a (Islamic law), state laws and principles deriving from international standard of law (e.g., human rights) coexist. In order to address the crucial question of access to justice, in this article, I stress the category of legal pluralism by introducing the hypothesis of an inaccessible normative pluralism as a key concept to capture the structural injustices of which Afghans are victims. Access to justice can be considered a foundational element of every legal project. Globally, the debates concerning the diffusion and application of human rights develop at the same time ideologically, politically, and pragmatically. Today in Afghanistan, these levels are expressed in all their complexity and ambivalence. It is therefore particularly significant to closely observe the work done by the Afghanistan Independent Human Rights Commission and to discuss the issue of human rights by starting from a reflection on what might be defined a socio-normative condition of inaccessibility.     

The Legacy of the Maastricht-Urteil and the Pluralist Movement

Abstract:  The Maastricht-Urteil of the German Constitutional Court of October 1993 has left a deep mark on EU law. Although some may consider it as part of legal history, the decision has never been overruled, and the ideas behind it are very much alive. This article tries to examine the legacy of that decision. From a practical point of view, the article focuses on the following issues: the current situation in Germany; the influence on other constitutional or supreme courts and on constitutional reforms in some Member States; the influence on the European Court of Justice and on the Treaty establishing a Constitution for Europe. Regarding theory, three sections of the article discuss a number of widespread ' idées reçues ' contained in the Maastricht-Urteil on notions such as the state, constituent power ( pouvoir constituant ), and democracy. The next section presents the movement of legal pluralism as an attempt to come to terms with the Maastricht-Urteil and its legacy. It criticises the radical versions of legal pluralism in view of the damage they may cause to essential dimensions of the rule of law. The final section reflects on the real motives behind the Maastricht-Urteil and its legacy, and on possible future developments.     

Legal Order,Legal Pluralism,Fundamental Principles. Europe and Its Law in Three Concepts

The essay analyses the way in which the concepts of legal order, legal pluralism and fundamental rights have been used to describe (and decide) what European integration is (and what it ought to be) from the perspective of the law. The essay does not provide a legal theory but limits itself to investigating how certain concepts have been employed to justify legal decisions and to construct legal theories. The juridical discourse on Europe is examined to identify some trends in contemporary legal culture: the decline of a tradition of legal thought, ‘legal dogmatics,’ the vanishing of the distinction between internal and external law (between domestic law and international law, and between positive law and morality), the growing importance of fundamental rights discourse, the centrality of balancing test, the widespread criticism of legal science's claim to neutrality and the consequent normative turn affecting legal scholarship.     

Beyond Consensus: Law, Disagreement and Democracy

Nowadays democratic liberal societies face a rising challenge in terms of fragmentation and erosion of shared values and ethical pluralism. Democracy is not anymore grounded in the possibility of a common understanding and interpretation of the same values. Neverthless, legal and political philosophy continue to focus on how to reach consensus, especially through monist, objectualist, contractualist, discursive and deliberative approaches, rather than openly affording the issue of disagreement. Far from being just a disruptive force, disagreement and conflict are matters of fact that no reflection on democracy can underevaluate. They are the major issues through which to look at the intersection of law, politics and morals. The inclusion of dissent is a powerful tool for moral recognition of different understandings of justice. That is where legal procedures become crucial. Law is a fundamental element in the building of a democracy. But it is also particularly exposed to disagreement. Language indeterminacy, dogmatic concepts and value pluralism constitute the main elements that lead to alternative and conflicting interpretations of law in a democratic framework. Major legal progress in the past has come from different understandings of the same legal materials. In this article I argue that respect for disagreement should be a moral principle in democracy and that the role of legal disagreement is essential to understand the evolution and the future directions of democracy as the government of a political community. To do so, a link between respect for disagreement and legal interpretation and argumentation must be established in order to make room for reason and avoid extreme skepticism on the contribution of law to the enforcement of democracy.     

围绕“人格”问题的法理论辩

"人格"问题在法学与法律上都是个众说纷纭的概念,由此也引起学界对其意义、范围以及与其它概念相区别的争论。诸如"人格的概念在法律上是否必需?","人格概念是否仅存在于私法制度之中?","人格"的概念是否与"法律主体"、"权利能力"的内涵相同?……等等,都常常引起人们的关注。作为法学、法律上的一个基础概念,人格有其存在的特殊意义,它既在私法上成为法律主体建构的基石,也在公法上为人的平等提供了依据。同时,人格既不等同于法律主体,也不类似于权利能力,而是法学、法律上具有独特内涵的专门范畴。     

法律多元主义及其中国语境：规范多元化

法律多元主义的产生与发展,对各国法治发展的影响不容忽视.当代中国自上而下推行法治,法律规范创制体系以国家制定法为中心,但现代社会中民间法的超强生命力、道德的法律化、法律原则的普遍适用等现象冲击了制定法的中心地位,法律规范的创制体系也由此趋于多元.这种多元主义法律观对当代中国的法治运行具有现实意义.     

Legal Pluralism,Gendered Discourses,and Hybridity in Land‐titling Practices in Cambodia

This article describes and analyses the tensions, ambivalence, and hybridity that prevail in the nexus between discourses of gender and the legal pluralism of the new, formalized, and customary ways of handling land titles. Based on empirical research in Cambodia, it reveals a number of mechanisms, challenges, and inconsistencies in the practice of land‐titling. Foremost, the practice of titling seems to be highly informed by local discourses of marriage, family, gender, and age, which all affect to whom land is assigned; this leaves a hybrid construction in the nexus between statutory law and customary practices. The article departs from this observation and adds three contributions – on a theoretical level – to existing research: by incorporating the dimensions of discourse analysis and legal hybridity, by linking the concept of legal pluralism to the process of hybridization, and by introducing the notion of hybridity of implementation as a supplement to hybridity of law.     

对霍菲尔德法律概念论的逻辑分析

霍菲尔德,美国著名的法学家,以对法律概念进行逻辑分析而闻名于世。他认为,法律中最基本的概念“权利”和“义务”至少可以分析为下面8个相互关联的概念:即权利、无权利、特权、义务、权力、无权力、豁免和责任。霍菲尔德的分析不仅得到了学术界的肯定,而且对美国财产法的发展有着重要的作用。我国学者对霍菲尔德的法律概念论有一些介绍,与其他的介绍性文章不同之处在于:本文用逻辑的方法对霍菲尔德的法律概念进行了详细的分析,揭示了这八个概念的具体含义。     

Toward an integration of economic and sociological approaches?

This article answers the question whether sociology of law and law and economics can be unificd into one integrated science. First, it is argued that an integration process inside law and economics has taken place, integrating most schools and partial analyses into one mainstream law and economics. Second, it is argued that there are no natural barriers against an integration of sociology and economics. Purely economic theories cannot and do not exist. What is calledeconomic analysis of law is basically a mixture of, for instance, 70 percent economics, 10 percent sociology, 10 percent psychology, and 10 percent other sciences. In addition, there is no such a thing as a purely sociological concept; concepts are sociological only in the sense that they are invented by people who call themselves sociologists.Nevertheless one should not expect that such a richer social science will lead to fundamentally different predictions and policy recommendations than those derived from the current simplistic economic analysis of law. The aspects studied by sociologists but assumed away by legal economists to date have in most cases no influence on the determination of (optimal) legal rules or on the long-run effects of legal rules.     

Pluralism and Integrity

One of the theoretical developments associated with the law of the European Union has been the flourishing of legal and constitutional theories that extol the virtues of pluralism. Pluralism in constitutional theory is offered in particular as a novel argument for the denial of unity within a framework of constitutional government. This paper argues that pluralism fails to respect the value of integrity. It also shows that at least one pluralist theory seeks to overcome the incoherence of pluralism by implicitly endorsing monism. The integrity and coherence of European law is best preserved by considering that both the national legal order and the international or European legal orders adopt sophisticated views of their own limits.     

The Limits of Legal Pluralism in the Roman Empire

The Roman empire was legally pluralistic. But what exactly does this entail in concrete terms? With the growth in historical studies of legal pluralism in the Roman empire, some significant differences in approach have emerged. This article tests and clarifies some of the limits in the current ‘legal pluralism’ conceptual landscape, focussing on disputes and dispute resolution. It is argued that a clearer distinction should be drawn between ‘normative’ and ‘jurisdictional’ pluralism, though both approaches still raise certain conceptual problems. The place of disputes within the family within this wider institutional picture is then taken as a case study in the final part of the paper, and it is suggested that while family disputes can evidence ‘legal pluralism’ in the ‘norms’ sense, there is less to suggest that there were a multitude of officially sanctioned legal fora available for resolving family disputes. As a result, many went beyond the law. This has wider implications for the study of legal pluralism in antiquity and the problem of integrating alternative dispute resolution (ADR) into the pluralistic picture.     

European Law Beyond ‘Ever Closer Union’ Repositioning the Concept,its Thrust and the ECJ's Comparative Methodology

The article investigates competing understandings of European law. It supports, against the prevailing EU‐centred understanding, an ecumenical concept that embraces EU law, supplementing international instruments, the European Convention on Human Rights and, importantly, various domestic laws enacting or responding to such transnational law, as well as European comparative law. To keep the concept in sync with European politics, it posits a new idea that binds the parts together: to provide for a European legal space rather than further European integration (the ever closer union). This idea can also serve as European law's functional equivalent to forming one legal order. European law thus conceived grasps the puzzling complex of interdependent legal orders, sets a common frame for corresponding reconstructions (European composite constructions, legal pluralism, network theories, federalism or intergovernmentalism) and allows forces with diverging outlooks to meet in one legal field, on one more neutral disciplinary platform. Within this framework, European comparative law finds a new mission as well as a sound legal basis.     

论民族法律文化视角下“法律多元”的含义与现状

在民族法律文化及少数民族习惯法研究者的学术话语当中,“法律多元”是一个常用的词汇,它通常被用以描述各族习惯法与国家法多元并存的法律现实状况。值得注意的是,“法律多元”本身并不是一个具有统一和明确含义的概念,在当代中国国家法制统一的背景之下,对“法律多元”的使用尤需慎重。当借助“法律多元”的理论对多重法律体系的状况进行描述时,应当根据特定的语境和视角,对“多元”的含义加以必要的说明。立足于少数民族法律文化研究的视角,语境化地对我国“法律多元”的含义以及现实状况进行描述和分析时,亦应如此。     

From Limited Realism to Plural Law. Normative Approach versus Cultural Perspective

Soft law, alternatives, informal conflict settlement procedures, are all the daily fare of legal sociologists who accept pluralism as part and parcel of the legal scene. Not so legal dogmatics, however, whose legal experts are still loath to think in terms of legal pluralism. For legal dogmatics, the "modern" theory of the State and its legal system—a theory forming the plinth of our Western concept of laws and rights—is founded on a pyramidal structure of legal norms and the exclusive validity of the laws created by the State. As a result, no given social system can formally allow several legal norms proposing different interpretations of the same matter to exist at the same time. In our "monocentrist" Western tradition of law and the State, pluralism is in oddity, an anachronism.     

A Comparative Study of the Principles Governing Criminal Responsibility in the Major Legal Systems of the World (England, United States, Germany, France, Denmark, Russia, China, and Islamic legal tradition)

The purpose of this survey is to examine the underlying principles of criminal responsibility in selected common law and continental law jurisdictions as well as in the Islamic legal tradition through the lens of comparative law (legal jurisdictions of England, Canada, United States, Germany, France, Denmark, Russia and China are subject to the legal analysis). By conducting a comprehensive legal analysis of the concept of crime in selected legal jurisdictions, this study reveals the common legal features pertinent to the concept of crime that are shared by the major legal systems of the world. Particular attention has been given to the thorny and much debated area of the subjective element of a crime and the standards employed to demarcate between intentional and negligent conduct. Turning to comparative law as an invaluable tool of legal analysis, the study demonstrates that there are more common characteristics than originally anticipated regarding the concept of crime, as well as the basis of the principle of culpability in such major legal systems.     

Las fuentes de conocimiento de lo jurídico*

The basic concept of law which was built on that of the state’s sovereignty has been transformed in such a way that can be no longer recognised as operable in the reality of politics. a great number of social changes have contributed to such a transformation; such as politic and internal social pluralism, the latter contradicts the idea of sovereignty and cohesion; the establishment of alternative centres of power which coexist with the state; the institutionalisation of contexts integrate their branches of power beyond those of the state –and consequently, they are becoming unavailable both for individual states-; and for individuals to claim their rights before international jurisdictions. This paperwork analyses formal legal sources from this perspective.     

民间法研究与批判精神

民间法研究反映了中国学术的进步,也反映了对法律发展动力的一种新认识。上世纪80年代民间法在国家—社会框架、地方性知识理论和法律多元理论支配下进行的研究,以及新世纪10年来就纠纷解决功能的探讨等,无不反映了民间法研究通过对移植式立法在实施过程中碰到的窘境的剖析,以批判性意识确立起自身独特的反思和批判精神。民间法研究的深入发展必须要回到民间法研究的既有立场上。     

法人类学视角的法：静态与动态

法律界定的不同,是不同法学流派展开其作业、并呈现给世人以不同法律知识和法学理论的逻辑前提.法人类学虽然是崇尚经验和事实描述的学术流派,但它并不排斥对法律概念的关注——因为法律的事实描述不能自动回答什么是法律的问题.不仅如此,法人类学发展史上的一些大师对法律在各自立场都做出了符合人类学命意的解释.法人类学视角的法,可二分为两个观察视角,在静态的视角上,它体现为接受、规范、拘束和可诉四方面;在动态的视角上,它又体现为地域、文化、多元和流变四方面.