Semiotics in legal theory design
pp. 129-151
in: Jan Broekman, Francis J. Mootz (eds), The semiotics of law in legal education, Berlin, Springer, 2011Abstract
Legal discourse unfolds with the authority to control the behavior of the members of community regarding the topic of the discourse called law. This master discourse consists of a complex system of signs, functioning through self-reference of the system's signs. Such a system operates autonomously of the environment within which it functions, as the thesis of law-as-autopoiesis shows (Luhmann, Teubner). That position forms an interesting contrast with positions of Hart or Dworkin. However, law observes and responds to its environment, which consists of the community's political morality, because although the system functions autonomously, the system's existence depends upon legitimacy bestowed by the community. This legitimacy is granted while the system mirrors the political morality. Semiotics allows for the study of these evolving signs of which the law is composed, as well as the ways in which the legal system utilizes these signs as the system autopoietically perpetuates.