Abstract
Exploring certain specific dimensions of practical reasoning in law—namely the possibility of recognizing an autonomous (structurally dialectic and intentionally dialogic) subject/subject rationality—this paper concentrates on one of the main challenges that the theory of legal argumentation, or a certain standard trend within this theory (emerging from Alexy, MacCormick, Aarnio and Peczenik), considers when invoking Wróblewski’s legacy (the analytical reconstitution of argumentation as a process of justification, with different horizontal or vertical levels). In effect, this challenge means on the one hand responding to the question of “how decisions can be justified when no deductive argument is sufficient to justify them” and, on the other hand, defending the thesis that syllogism “provides” the “framework” in which all “the other arguments make sense as legal arguments” (MacCormick). Is this a plausible challenge or does it encourage possible convergence? In order to answer this question, I will allude to some relevant “anti- deductive critiques” (from the founding fathers Viehweg, Perelman and Toulmin) and a very specific jurisprudentialist understanding of legal rationality (which explores the judicium/legal system connection and a dialectics between problem and system), and I will refer to the stimulus of a certain alternative logical perspective (“legal logic beyond deduction”) that can be identified in Sartor’s “doxification of practical reasoning”. In addition, one of the main concerns of our common thematic core must not be forgotten: the confrontation between the democratic (discursive) legitimation of jurisdictio as potestas and the apparently non deliberative and non-democratic possibilities of practical–prudential rationality.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Similar content being viewed by others
Notes
MacCormick prefers the counterpoint clear cases/problematic or problematized cases (to the usual easy cases/hard cases): see [[21]: 48–52].
To use the well-known formulation by Atienza: [[8]: 132, 235, 247–248].
Still following MacCormick on this point [[19]: x].
See the synthesis proposed by Alexy in [[5]: 433–449].
A more extensive and more isolated status according to A)’ than according to A)’’.
“Cases are won and lost through meticulous care—or its lack—in following through every concept that counts, and testing rigorously for each one what particulars will count as an instance of that concept…” [[21]: 42].
Even though in a more analytical than chronological understanding: see [[19]: ix].
“A set of propositions is mutually consistent if each can without contradiction be asserted in conjunction with every other and with their conjunction…” [[20]: 266].
See especially the developments proposed in Rhetoric and the Rule of Law, developments which, without questioning the (mainly) synchronic character of normative coherence, assimilate some diachronic components associated with Dworkin’s integrity (and the chain novel analogy): [[21]: 233–236].
A similar path (exploring all these levels) is developed with regard to the specific problem of interpretation. See [[21]: 121–142].
Which means that we have a two-stage subsumption (subsumption formula lato sensu) and that deduction of the legal judgment from premises corresponds to subsumption formula stricto sensu: see [5].
“Dies geschieht in der externen Rechtfertigung, in der alle im juristischen Diskurs zulässigen Argumente möglich sind…” ([1]: 282, 342).
“…(I) Vernunft [[1]: 233–255, 346–348], (II) Empirie [[1]: 285–287], (III) Die canones der Auslegung) [[1]: 288–307], (IV) Dogmatik [[1]: 307–334], (V) Präjudizien [[1]: 334–341], (VI) spezielle juristische Argumentationsformen [[1]: 341–346] …” See also [[1]: 361 ff.] („Tafel der erarbeiteten Regeln und Formen“).
“[R]ules are norms (…) that enclose a definite ought (…) [and] subsuming is the form how to apply rules [;] (…) [p]rinciples, in opposition, enclose an ideal ought (…) [and] their typical form of application is weighing and balancing…” [[4]: 38–39].
To recall Habermas’s incisive critique: [[12]: 366–370].
It is indeed an opportunity to “conciliate” the very different contributions by Rödig and Kriele.
See mainly the possibility of a normative regulation of transformations) [[1]: 278–279].
“All the transformations (…) are similar from the operational point of view, since they are non- equivalent: a proposition is transformed into another one, intensionally not identical with it, and extensionally not equivalent to it. In other words, the second proposition has another meaning than the first, and cannot be deductively derived from the first…” [[27]: 171].
“The question of whether standard logic ought to be modified in light of the fact that for resolution of conflicts subsumption at the first level is often not the last word, may remain open here…” [[5]: 435].
The “group” VI: spezielle juristische Argumentationsformen [[1]: 341–346].
Which opens to Alexy another (second) opportunity to reconcile apparently irreconcilable participants in this discourse, such as Engisch, Larenz… and Kriele! See especially [[1]: 281, note 44].
“Prinzipien und Werten unterscheiden sich also nur wegen ihres einerseits deontologischen und andererseits axiologischen Charackters“[[2]: 133].
See the synthesis proposed in [[3]: 139, 146–149].
“In this ideology rationality is understood as the value which decisions ought to implement through their proper justification” [[34]: 311]. “[J]ustification of a judicial decision is the one way of demonstrating the rationality of decision and at the same time acting as a control on that rationality" [[34]: 209].
“At this point, therefore, what are needed are general, hypothetical statements, which can act as bridges…”: here we are obviously employing the words of Toulmin [[31]: 98].
“A decision is internally rational if (…) it is inferred from the knowledge the decision-maker has, and the preferences which he accepts, when the inference follows the rules he accepts…” [[34]: 210]. “[I]nternal rationality seeks consistency of decisions (…) [and] does not deal with the features of premises but only with their correct relation with the decision — according to the rules of justificatory reasoning used…” [[34]: 311].
“The epistemic premise, i.e. the knowledge of the decision-maker, could be treated as false or inadequate…” [[34]: 210].
“[T]he evaluations could be rejected…” [[34]: 210].
“[T]he reasoning [could be] treated as faulty…” [[34]: 210].
“In the weak version external rationality is not taken into account and only internal rationality is important” [[34]: 210].
As we have already partially seen, the (so-called) standard theory of argumentation, whilst circumscribing legal internal justification to logical-deductive consistence, is forced to integrate the whole deployment of analogical reasoning, as well as the construction of arguments a contrario, a fortiori and ad absurdum, in external or second order justification.
Until the point of admitting that hard cases are compatible with both an internal and with an external reconstitution.
There is a distinction still to be made between legally determined and legally undetermined complex decisional syllogisms: [[34]: 200–203].
“I call a ‘rule of decision’ a rule, which is the premise from which the decision is inferred” [[34]: 242]. The priority of a norm’s perspective is not questioned (on the contrary!) when the Author considers the possibility of reconstituting the rule of decision as the valid legal rule interpreted for a concrete case [[34]: 243–244], and neither is it when he faces the problem of judge-made law (precedents are exemplarily treated as one of the possibilities of mobilizing the rule of decision as a legal rule interpreted independently of the concrete case) [[34]: 244–245].
I am of course alluding to Alexy’s balancing and its alternative type of rationality.
“[L]imiting logic to internal deductive justification has the effect of pushing all most significant aspects of legal reasoning outside the competence of logic, in the undetermined domain of second order justification. So, it is no surprise that even the most radical adversaries of formal logic reasoning could agree with this approach, which allows to separate formal logic (having a negligible role) from the theory of informal legal argumentation. In such a perspective the theory of legal argumentation rather than formal logic becomes the only significant methodology of legal reasoning…” [[30]: 402].
This means admitting the decisive mediation of cognition and planning and these as inseparable dimensions of an “ability of forming new conative states”: “practical reasoning is indeed the process through which an agent builds new conative states on the basis of the epistemic and conative states it possesses” [[30]: 14].
This aim faces the problem of plurality and differences in contemporary legal thinking (as a “battleground of apparently incompatible methods and approaches”) in order to “elaborate a view point from which it may be possible to combine and integrate such diverse models”. “This viewpoint is constituted by the assumption that legal reasoning can be viewed as an application of a broader human competence, that is, practical cognition… “[[30]: XXV].
“Then, practical reasoning will lead me to adopt one of those plans, in consideration of its advantages (…) and its costs (…) and also of how it interferes with plans or achieving alternative goals.” [[30]:14].
Echoing the formulations by Dunne [[11]:174].
Citing the famous collective work organized by Manfred Riedel [29].
We are invoking Bubner’s diagnosis [[10]: 88–96].
“Der Name 'die Technik‘ist hier so wesentlich verstanden, daß er sich in seiner Bedeutung deckt mit dem Titel 'die vollendete Metaphysik’ …” [[13]: 76].
These binomials are exemplarily considered in Sartor’s reconstitution [[30]: 398–401].
“Qu’a-t-on gagné en transformant en un syllogisme (…) analytique (…) une argumentation non-contraignante (…) ?” [[28]: 3].
As is sufficiently well-known (but very important in his critique of the principle of syllogism), Toulmin makes clear that this crucial distinction should not be confused with other possible modes of division: formally valid/not formally valid arguments, warrant-using/warrant-establishing arguments, arguments leading to necessary conclusions/arguments leading only to probable conclusions. See [[31]:123 ff., 127 ff., 135 ff.].
See the exemplary reconstruction of this reference (assuming Hegel’s “phenomenological” intentions revisited-rewritten by Heidegger and Gadamer) in [[10]:13–16, 17–26, 50–57, 84–87, 106–112].
This answer explores the possibilities of Castanheira Neves’s jurisprudentialism. I propose a synthesis of Castanheira Neves’ proposal (with the main bibliographical references) in one of the sections of José de Sousa e Brito’s [[9]: 516–519].
See the arguments I have developed in [[17]: 46–48, 51 ff.].
With principles (as warrants) benefitting from a presumption of communitarian validity, statutes (as criteria) from a presumption of political-constitutional pedigree or authority-potestas, legal dogmatic models (as warrants or criteria) benefiting from a presumption of rationality or rational conclusiveness and, last but not least, precedents-exempla (as criteria) benefiting from a singularly contextualized presumption of correctness (justeza).
See the synthesis I have proposed in [[15]: 489 ff.].
I have developed this defense of a methodological unity (rejecting the easy/hard binomial) in [18].
In the original extended sense that I have tried to attribute to Wrobléwski: supra, 2.1.
I allude here to another indispensable distinction proposed by Castanheira Neves: see, in particular [[24]: 149 ff.]. This distinction concerns two aspects and two possibilities for experimenting with legal statutes, one of them (ratio legis) considering commands (as an expression of voluntas) and the corresponding programs in their specific immanent teleological rationality (or, in the words of Dworkin, their indispensable arguments of policy), and the other (ratio juris) testing the juridicalness of the corresponding criteria, i.e. confronting their immediate teleological intelligibility as rules with the normative claims and demands of principles (considering arguments of policy from the predominant perspective of arguments of principle).
The parallel with Esser is explictly defended by Castanheira Neves in [[26]: 276 ff.].
References
Alexy, Robert. 1978. Theorie der juristischen Argumentation. Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp.
Alexy, Robert. 1985. Theorie der Grundrechte, 2nd ed. Frankfurt: Suhrkamp Verlag.
Alexy, Robert. 1988. Sistema jurídico, principios jurídicos y razón práctica. In Doxa 5.
Alexy, Robert. 1999. My philosophy of law: The Institutionalisation of Reason. In The Law in Philosophical Perspectives, Law and Philosophy Library 41, Dordrecht/Boston/London: Kluwer.
Alexy, Robert. 2003. On Balancing and Subsumption. A Structural Comparison. In Ratio Juris 16(4).
Alexy, Robert. 2009. The Reasonableness of Law. In Reasonableness and Law, ed. Sartor et al. Berlin: Springer.
Alexy, Robert. 2010. The dual nature of law. In Ratio Juris 23(2).
Atienza, Manuel. 1997. Las razones del derecho. Teorias de la argumentacion juridica. Madrid: Centro de Estudios Constitucionales.
Brito, José de Sousa e. 2015. 20th Century Legal Philosophy in Portugal. In Legal Philosophy in the Twentieth Century: The Civil Law World, ed. Enrico Pattaro and Corrado Roversi. Dordrecht/Heidelberg: Springer.
Bubner, Rüdiger. 1990. Dialektik als Topik: Bausteine zu einer lebensweltlichen Theorie der Rationalität. Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp.
Dunne, Joseph. 2001. Back to the Rough Ground. Practical Judgment and the Lure of Technique. Notre Dame Indiana: University of Notre Dame.
Habermas, Jürgen. 1999. Anhang zu Faktizität und Geltung: Replik auf Beiträge zu einem Symposium der Cardozo Law School. In Die Einbeziehung des Anderen. Studien zur politischen Theorie. Frankfurt: Suhrkamp Verlag.
Heidegger, Martin. 1985. Vorträge und Aufsätze. Auflage: Neske Pfullingen.
Heidegger, Martin. 2001. Sein und Zeit. 18th edition (re-impressing the 15th). Tübingen: Max Niemeyer Verlag.
Linhares, José Manuel Aroso. 2012. Law’s cultural project and the claim to universality or the equivocalities of a familiar debate. International Journal for the Semiotics of Law 25 (4): 489–503.
Linhares, José Manuel Aroso. 2012. Evidence (or proof?) as Law ́s Gaping Wound: A Persistent False aporia? In Boletim da Faculdade de Direito: Universidade de Coimbra 88(1).
Linhares, José Manuel Aroso. 2013. Phronêsis und Tertialität: Die Behandlung des Neuen als Kern des “geworfenen Entwurfs” des Rechts, Von der Spezifikation zum Schluss: Rhetorisches, topisches und plausibles Schließen in Normen- und, Regelsystemen ed. Lothar Philipps and Rainhard Bengez: Nomos Verlag.
Linhares, José Manuel Aroso. 2017. O binómio casos fáceis/casos difíceis e a categoria de inteligibilidade. Sistema jurídico: um contraponto indispensável no mapa do discurso jurídico contemporâneo? Coimbra: Imprensa da Universidade de Coimbra.
MacCormick, Neil. 1994. Legal Reasoning and Legal Theory (1978), 2nd ed. Oxford. Oxford: Clarendon Press.
MacCormick, Neil. 1998. Coherence in Legal Justification. In The Philosophy of Legal Reasoning, ed. Scott Brewer. Harvard: Harvard University.
MacCormick, Neil. 2005. Rhetoric and the Rule of Law. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
MacCormick, Neil. 2007. Institutions of Law. An Essay in Legal Theory. Oxford, Oxford University Press.
Neves, António Castanheira. 1992. El actual problema metodológico de la realización del Derecho. Revista de la Facultad de Derecho de la Universidad Complutense 79.
Neves, António Castanheira. 1993. Metodologia Jurídica. Problemas fundamentais. Coimbra: Coimbra Editora.
Neves, António Castanheira. 2003. O actual problema metodológico da interpretação jurídica. Coimbra: Coimbra Editora.
Neves, António Castanheira. 1995. O actual problema metodológico da realização do direito. In Digesta—Escritos acerca do Direito, do Pensamento Jurídico, da sua Metodologia e outros, volume II. Coimbra: Coimbra Editora.
Peczenik, Aleksander. 1979. Non-equivalent transformations and the law. In Argumentation und Hermeneutik in der Jurisprudenz, Rechtstheorie Beihefte (Bh RT 1), ed. Opalek Krawietz and Schramm Peczenik. Berlin: Duncker & Humblot.
Perelman, Charles. 1999. Logique juridique. Nouvelle rhétorique, Paris: Dalloz.
Riedel, Manfred (ed.). 1972–1974. Rehabilitierung Der Praktischen Philosophie. Freiburg: Rombach Verlag.
Sartor, Giovanni. 2005. Legal Reasoning: A Cognitive Approach to Law. Dordrecht: Springer.
Toulmin, Stephen. 1958. The Uses of Argument. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Viehweg, Theodor. 1953. Topik und Jurisprudenz. München: Beck.
Welsch, Wolfgang. 1991. Unsere postmoderne Moderne. Weinheim: Acta Humaniora.
Wróblewski, Jerzy. 1992. Sądowe stosowanie prawa [The Judicial Application of Law]. ed. Zenon Bankowski and Neil MacCormick. Dordrecht: Kluwer Academic Publishers.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Additional information
Publisher's Note
Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Linhares, J.M.A. The Rehabilitation of Practical Reasoning and the Persistence of Deductivism: An Impossible Challenge?. Int J Semiot Law 33, 155–174 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11196-019-09670-z
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11196-019-09670-z