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Law as Institution

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Law as Institution

Part of the book series: Law and Philosophy Library ((LAPS,volume 90))

Abstract

In Chapter 4 there is the attempt to build a bridge between such theory and the traditional institutionalist theories of law. These are reviewed and then supplemented through the neo-institutionalism more recently defended by Neil MacCormick and Ota Weinberger. Neo-institutionalism is then said to be the most promising approach to cope with the ontology of law, though some reform in the standard theory is proposed to render more plausible and less circular the definition given of what an “institution” means and is. In particular, constitutive rules or “declarations” cannot kept outside an institutionalist perspective, though they cannot be said to produce directly “institutional facts” or better the scope of action which the “institution” consists of. They are rather “conditions” to be prescribed in understanding and performing a piece of conduct. This is why a definition of “institution” is advanced whereby constitutive rules are integrated with a notion of efficacy and effective performance.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    S. Romano, L’ordinamento giuridico, p. 96. On the continuing adherence of Romano’s institutionalism to legal posititivism cf. G. Fassò, Il giudice e l’adeguamento del diritto alla realtà storico-sociale, in Id., Scritti di filosofia del diritto, ed. by E. Pattaro, C. Faralli and G. Zucchini, vol. 3, Milan 1982, p. 993.

  2. 2.

    S. Romano, L’ordinamento giuridico, pp. 123–124.

  3. 3.

    S. Romano, Frammenti di un dizionario giuridico, p. 72.

  4. 4.

    S. Romano, L’ordinamento giuridico, p. 96.

  5. 5.

    See H. L. A. Hart, The Concept of Law, pp. 55ff., and cf. P. Winch, The Idea of a Social Science and its Relation to Philosophy, pp. 57ff.

  6. 6.

    S. Romano, L’ordinamento giuridico, pp. 96–97. My square brackets.

  7. 7.

    Cf. G. Tarello, Ordinamento giuridico, in Id., Cultura giuridica e politica del diritto, Bologna 1988, pp. 186, 188. On some parallels between Kelsen’s work and Romano’s cf. V. Frosini, Kelsen e Capograssi, Milan 1988.

  8. 8.

    S. Romano, L’ordinamento giuridico, p. 14. Romano, in order to assert the primacy of the order over the norms, also uses an organicist metaphor: see ibid., p. 12.

  9. 9.

    See ibid., pp. 70–71.

  10. 10.

    On the response to Romano’s ideas by Italian legal doctrine see A. Agnelli, L’istituzionalismo giuridico italiano dal 1945 ai giorni nostri, in Annuario bibliografico di filosofia del diritto, Milan 1965, pp. 267ff.

  11. 11.

    W. Cesarini Sforza, Il diritto dei privati, 2nd ed., Milan 1963, p. 11.

  12. 12.

    Ibid., p. 12. Emphasis in original.

  13. 13.

    Ibid., p. 13.

  14. 14.

    G. Fassò, La storia come esperienza giuridica, Milan 1953, p. 100.

  15. 15.

    Ibid., p. 102.

  16. 16.

    Ibid., p. 105.

  17. 17.

    Ibid., pp. 106–107.

  18. 18.

    See ibid., pp. 82–83. For an opposite opinion cf. G. Gurvitch, L’idée du droit social, reprint, Aalen 1972, p. 118, and M. Oakeshott, On Human Conduct, Oxford 1975, p. 123.

  19. 19.

    S. Romano, L’ordinamento giuridico, pp. 15–16.

  20. 20.

    Cited by A. Baratta, Presentazione, in M. Hauriou, Teoria dell’istituzione e della fondazione, ed. by W. Cesarini Sforza, Milan 1967, p. xxiv. Emphasis in original.

  21. 21.

    C. Schmitt, Die drei Arten des rechtswissenschaftlichen Denkens, Hamburg 1934, p. 24. On the divergence between Schmitt and Romano on the point of the one’s rejection and the other’s acceptance of the positive-law tradition, see A. Catania, Carl Schmitt e Santi Romano, in Id., Il diritto tra forza e consenso. Saggi sulla filosofia giuridica del Novecento, Napoli 1987, pp. 150ff.

  22. 22.

    Cf. I Maus, Bürgerliche Rechtstheorie und Faschismus. Zur sozialen Funktion und aktuellen Wirkung der Theorie Carl Schmitts, 2nd ed., München 1980, pp. 152ff.

  23. 23.

    C. Schmitt, Staat, Bewegung, Volk. Die Dreigliederung der politischen Einheit, Hamburg 1934, p. 33.

  24. 24.

    S. Romano, L’ordinamento giuridico, p. 25. It is, then, questionable whether Romano is engaged in a “juridification of the social”, or perhaps more a “socialization of the legal”: in this connection see G. Tarello, Progetto per la voce ‘Ordinamento giuridico’ di una enciclopedia, in Politica del diritto, 1975, pp. 72ff.

  25. 25.

    S. Romano, L’ordinamento giuridico, p. 27.

  26. 26.

    For Romano the two terms are equivalent: see S. Romano, L’ordinamento giuridico, p. 4, note 2.

  27. 27.

    S. Romano, Frammenti di un dizionario giuridico, p. 82. “Any social entity, that is, any institution in the sense in which that word is synonymous with social entity […] is a legal order” (S. Romano, Principii di diritto costituzionale generale, 2nd ed., Milano 1946, p. 55).

  28. 28.

    S. Romano, L’ordinamento giuridico, p. 27. “Every institution is a legal order and every legal order is an institution” (S. Romano, Principii di diritto costituzionale generale, 2nd ed., p. 55).

  29. 29.

    See S. Romano, L’ordinamento giuridico, pp. 33–34.

  30. 30.

    Ibid., p. 34.

  31. 31.

    Ibid., p. 35.

  32. 32.

    Ibid.

  33. 33.

    Ibid., pp. 37, 38.

  34. 34.

    Ibid., p. 38. Cf. the entry for “Autonomia”, in S. Romano, Frammenti di un dizionario giuridico, pp. 14ff.

  35. 35.

    S. Romano, L’ordinamento giuridico, p. 39. “Every institution […], as an entity with a structure and organization of its own, is accordingly an order, a more or less stable and permanent pattern, and brings to unity the individuals and other elements making it up, taking on in relation to them a life of its own and forming a body in itself, constituting a ‘legal order’” (S. Romano, Principii di diritto costituzionale generale, p. 55, my emphasis).

  36. 36.

    See S. Romano, L’ordinamento giuridico, p. 39.

  37. 37.

    Ibid., p. 43.

  38. 38.

    Ibid., p. 54.

  39. 39.

    See S. Romano, Frammenti di un dizionario giuridico, p. 68.

  40. 40.

    Cf. e.g., V. E. Orlando, Stato e diritto, in Id., Diritto pubblico generale. Scritti vari (1881–1940), Milano 1954, pp. 291–293, and N. Bobbio, Teoria e ideologia nella dottrina di Santi Romano, in Id., Dalla struttura alla funzione. Nuovi studi di teoria del diritto, Milano 1977, p. 173. “Romano’s theory”, notes Uberto Scarpelli, “does not offer any well-defined model or precise criteria for the legal resolution of the antinomies and alternatives that emerge from social issues” (U. Scarpelli, Istituzione, in Gli strumenti del sapere contemporaneo, vol. 2, I concetti, UTET, Turin 1985, p. 437). The “slipperiness” of the concept of “institution” is stressed also by Sabino Cassese, who then arrives at the conclusion that the concept has now become “useless” (S. Cassese, Istituzione: un concetto ormai inntile, in Politica del diritto, 1979, p. 53)

  41. 41.

    See S. Romano, L’ordinamento giuridico, p. 40.

  42. 42.

    See ibid., p. 36, note 30.

  43. 43.

    See e.g., N. MacCormick, Law as Institutional Fact, in N. MacCormick and O. Weinberger, An Institutional Theory of Law, pp. 49ff., and O. Weinberger, Bausteine des institutionalistischen Rechtspositivismus, in O. Weinberger, Recht, Institution und Rechtspolitik, pp. 32–34.

  44. 44.

    See J. R. Searle, Speech Acts. An Essay in the Philosophy of Language, Cambridge 1969, pp. 50ff.

  45. 45.

    See e.g., N. MacCormick, Institutions, Arrangements and Practical Information, in Ratio Juris, 1988, pp. 73ff. In relation to the “institution”, MacCormick distinguishes between “institutive”, “terminative” and “consequential” norms: see N. MacCormick, Law as Institutional Fact, pp. 52ff. On this distinction cf. H. Rottleuthner, Rechtstheorie und Rechtssoziologie, Munich 1981, pp. 58ff. Cf. also A. Pintore, Da Ross a MacCormick: Recenti sviluppi nella teoria analitica dei concetti giuridici, in Studi economico-giuridici in memoria di Antonio Basciu, Naples 1986, pp. 267ff., and A. Pintore, La teoria analitica dei concetti giuridici, Naples 1990.

  46. 46.

    S. Romano, L’ordinamento giuridico, p. 27.

  47. 47.

    Ibid., pp. 27–28. See also S. Romano, Frammenti di un dizionario giuridico, pp. 68–71. The use of the term “precept” does not, however, commit Romano to an imperativist conception (see S. Romano, Op. cit., pp. 140–141). In this connection it should be noted that for Romano “neither the individual norms nor the order receiving and accommodating them considered as a whole have addressees” (Ibid., p. 142).

  48. 48.

    See S. Romano, L’ordinamento giuridico, pp. 35–36

  49. 49.

    Ibid., p. 42. My emphasis.

  50. 50.

    Cf. G. Tarello, Ordinamento giuridico, pp. 186–188, and V. Frosini, Kelsen e Romano, pp. 55–56.

  51. 51.

    Cf. A. Tarantino, La teoria della necessità dell’ordinamento giuridico, 2nd ed., Milan 1980.

  52. 52.

    V. Frosini, Op. cit., pp. 53–54. Cf. O. Condorelli, Il ‘diritto fondamentale’, in Id., Scritti sul diritto e sullo Stato, Giuffrè, Milan 1970. Compare also C. Mortati, La costituzione materiale, Milano 1940.

  53. 53.

    Cf. G. Gavazzi, Santi Romano e la teoria generale del diritto, in Le dottrine giuridiche di oggi e l’insegnamento di Santi Romano, ed. by P. Biscaretti di Ruffia, Milan 1977, pp. 67–86.

  54. 54.

    R. Dworkin, A Matter of Principle, Oxford 1986, p. 131. See also H. L. A. Hart, Legal Positivism, in The Encyclopedia of Philosophy, ed. by P. Edwards, vol. 4, New York, NY 1967.

  55. 55.

    S. Romano, Principii di diritto costituzionale generale, p. 55.

  56. 56.

    Ibid., pp. 55–56.

  57. 57.

    S. Romano, Osservazioni sulla completezza dell’ordinamento statale, in Scritti minori, vol. 1, ed. by G. Zanobini, 2nd ed., Milan 1990, p. 458.

  58. 58.

    S. Romano, Principii di diritto costituzionale generale, p. 56.

  59. 59.

    A contrary view seems to be taken by Gianluigi Palombella. See G. Palombella, L’istituzione del diritto. Una prospettiva di recerca, in Materiali per una storia della cultura giuridica, 1990, p. 378: “In the institutional theory, the notion of law/order/social body rules out the possibility that the norm may effectively precede social practice”.

  60. 60.

    S. Romano, Principii di diritto costituzionale generale, p. 59. For a critique of the legal pluralism defended by Romano see A. Passerin d’Entrèves, La dottrina dello Stato. Elementi di analisi e di interpretazione, Turin 1967, pp. 184ff., where the centrality of the notion of sovereignty is affirmed (the capacity to produce and impose norms) in the definition of legal order: “In these two combined attributes, reaction and the imposition of law, which are by definition contained in ‘sovereignty’, the other orders do not partake, or do so only in part” (ibid., p. 187). In Pietro Costa’s view, instead, Romano’s doctrine remains “Statocentric”: see P. Costa, Lo Stato immaginario. Metafore e paradigmi nella cultura giuridica italiana fra Ottocento e Novecento, Milano 1986, pp. 127ff.

  61. 61.

    Cf. G. Gavazzi, Op. cit., p. 76.

  62. 62.

    S. Romano, Principii di diritto costituzionale generale, p. 58.

  63. 63.

    Cf. G. Gavazzi, Op. cit., p. 76.

  64. 64.

    See S. Romano, Frammenti di un dizionario giuridico, pp. 204ff.; O. Weinberger, Bausteine des institutionalistischen Rechtspositivismus, p. 17; O. Weinberger, Die Bedeutung der Logik für die moderne Rechtstheorie, in O. Weinberger, Recht, Institution and Rechtspolitik, p. 91; O. Weinberger, Ontologie, Hermeneutik und der Begriff des geltenden Rechts, p. 117; and N. MacCormick, On Analytical Jurisprudence, in N. MacCormick and O. Weinberger, An Institutional Theory of Law, pp. 97ff.

  65. 65.

    See S. Romano, Frammenti di un dizionario giuridico, pp. 65ff. This obviously does not commit Romano to the adoption of a neo-cognitivist meta-ethics. Cf. O. Weinberger, Bausteine des institutionalistischen Rechtspositivismus, p. 42.

  66. 66.

    O. Weinberger, Verfassungstheorie vom Standpunkt des neuen Institutionalismus, p. 103.

  67. 67.

    Ibid., italics in the text.

  68. 68.

    See N. MacCormick, Law as Institutional Fact, in N. MacCormick, O. Weinberger, An Institutional Theory of Law, pp. 49ff. and N. MacCormick, Institutions, Arrangements and Practical Information, pp. 76–77 (here MacCormick speaks of “legal institutional facts” (p. 77)). Weinberger does in fact distinguish between “institution” and “institutional fact” in the sense that “institutional facts are facts that depend on institutions” (O. Weinberger, Ontologie, Hermeneutik und der Begriff des geltenden Rechts, p. 117). However, there is in Weinberger’s work no further explanation of the difference between “institution” and “institutional fact”. In fact, this work lacks any precise definition of “institution”. Weinberger’s defence that it is not always necessary to define the phenomena one deals with (see O. Weinberger, Bausteine des institutionalistischen Rechtspositivismus, p. 30), seems to me rather weak.

  69. 69.

    S. Romano, Frammenti di un dizionario giuridico, p. 70, my emphasis. See also ibid., pp. 80, 84.

  70. 70.

    It would accordingly seem that Romano sometimes treats the phenomenon of law as a mere “brute fact”; which has led more than one person to take a distance from institutionalism because of its apparent insensitivity to the eminently normative aspects of law. See e.g., L. Lombardi Vallauri, Corso di filosofia del diritto, Padua 1981, p. 125: “Unlike Santi Romano, we do not necessarily identify the law with the social body, since this would mean reducing law to a mere fact, depriving it of its normative nature”.

  71. 71.

    See N. MacCormick, Ein Postskriptum zu Weinbergers Einleitung, in N. MacCormick and O. Weinberger, Grundlagen des Institutionalistischen Rechtspositivismus, Berlin 1985, pp. 57–59.

  72. 72.

    See e.g., Weinberger and MacCormick’s critique of the claimed derivation of an “is” from an “ought” by John Searle: see N. MacCormick and O. Weinberger, An Institutional Theory of Law, pp. 21, 24. For an analogous critique cf. K. O. Apel, Das Apriori der Kommunikationsgemeinschaft und die Grundlagen der Ethik, in Id., Transformation der Philosophie, vol. 2, Frankfurt am Main 1984, p. 416. Cf. also J. R. Searle, Speech Acts, pp. 175ff.

  73. 73.

    See O. Weinberger, Ontologie, Hermeneutik und der Begriff des geltenden Rechts, p. 113. However, see O. Weinberger, Hans Kelsen als Philosoph, in Id., Normentheorie als Grundlage der Jurisprudenz und Ethik. Eine Auseinandersetzung mit Hans Kelsens Theorie der Normen, Berlin 1981, p. 186, where we read: “Die Unterscheidung von Sein und Sollen ist im Kelsenschen Sinne […] als begriffliche Differenzierung von Denkinhalten, als semantische Unterscheidung verschiedener, gegenseitig ineinander unübersetzbarer Satzarten zu verstehen” (my emphasis).

  74. 74.

    O. Weinberger, Ontologie, Hermeneutik und der Begriff des geltenden Rechts, p. 112.

  75. 75.

    See ibid.

  76. 76.

    Ibid.

  77. 77.

    See O. Weinberger, Rechtslogik. Versuch einer Anwendung moderner Logik auf das juristische Denken, Vienna-New York 1970, pp. 212ff.

  78. 78.

    O. Weinberger, Bausteine des institutionalistischen Rechtspositivismus, p. 25.

  79. 79.

    See O. Weinberger, Eine Semantik für praktische Philosophie, in Beiträge zur Philosophie von Stephan Körner, ed. by R. Haller, Amsterdam 1983, pp. 219ff.

  80. 80.

    See O. Weinberger, Ontologie, Hermeneutik und der Begriff des geltenden Rechts, p. 114. I would recall in this connection that for the Czech scholar ontology is above all stipulative in nature: see e.g., O. Weinberger, Bausteine des institutionalistischen Rechtspositivismus, p. 15.

  81. 81.

    See O. Weinberger, Op. cit., p. 20.

  82. 82.

    See O. Weinberger, Die Bedeutung der Logik für die moderne Rechtstheorie, p. 91. Cf. also O. Weinberger, The Role of Rules, in Ratio Juris, 1988, p. 225, where we read: “To follow a rule does not presuppose being explicitly aware of the rule or being able to formulate it in a linguistic form”.

  83. 83.

    See O. Weinberger, Ontologie, Hermeneutik und der Begriff des geltenden Rechts, p. 116.

  84. 84.

    See ibid.

  85. 85.

    See O. Weinberger, Bausteine des institutionalistischen Rechtspositivismus, pp. 37–38.

  86. 86.

    O. Weinberger, Ontologie, Hermeneutik und der Begriff des geltenden Rechts, p. 111.

  87. 87.

    See ibid., pp. 122, 124.

  88. 88.

    See ibid., p. 122.

  89. 89.

    S. Romano, Frammenti di un dizionario giuridico, p. 84.

  90. 90.

    See O. Weinberger, Bausteine des institutionalistischen Rechtspositivismus, p. 14, and O. Weinberger, Reine oder funktionalistische Rechtsbetrachtung? in Reine Rechtslehre im Spiegel ihrer Fortsetzer und Kritiker, ed. by O. Weinberger and W. Krawietz, Vienna-New York 1988, p. 219.

  91. 91.

    O. Weinberger, Ontologie, Hermeneutik und der Begriff des geltenden Rechts, p. 117.

  92. 92.

    Ibid.

  93. 93.

    See e.g., O. Weinberger, Bausteine des institutionalistischen Rechtspositivismus, p. 33: “Institutionen sind Rahmensystemen des menschlichen Handelns”; and O. Weinberger, Norm und Institution. Eine Einführung in die Theorie des Rechts, Vienna 1988, p. 29: “Sie [the institutions] sind Handlungsrahmen”.

  94. 94.

    O. Weinberger, Institutionentheorie und institutionalistischer Rechtspositivismus, in O. Weinberger, Recht, Institution und Rechtspolitik, p. 151.

  95. 95.

    O. Weinberger, Bausteine des institutionalistischen Rechtspositivismus, p. 34.

  96. 96.

    O. Weinberger, The Role of Rules, p. 225.

  97. 97.

    L. Wittgenstein, Philosophical Investigations (I, 202), p. 81e. Emphasis in original.

  98. 98.

    J. R. Searle, Speech Acts. An Essay in the Philosophy of Language, Cambridge 1969, p. 34. See also J. R. Searle, The Construction of Social Reality, London 1996, pp. 79ff.

  99. 99.

    J. R. Searle, Speech Acts, pp. 51–52.

  100. 100.

    G. Robles, Was ist eine Regel? in Vernunft und Erfahrung im Rechtsdenken der Gegenwart, ed. by T. Eckhoff, L. M. Friedman and J. Uusitalo, Berlin 1986, p. 28.

  101. 101.

    No less problematic is the position of those who recognize that the constitutive norms are not reducible to regulative (prescriptive) norms but end up conceiving of the former as “quasi-commands” (A. Ross, Directives and Norms, New York, NY 1968, p. 57) thus going back on all they had previously conceded to a “liberal” vision of norms.

  102. 102.

    I am here adopting ideas contained in the writings of Amedeo Giovanni Conte. See e.g., A. G. Conte, Materiali per una tipologia delle regole, in Materiali per una storia della cultura giuridica, 1985, pp. 345ff.

  103. 103.

    See e.g. A. G. Conte, Regola costitutiva in Wittgenstein, in Uomini senza qualità. La crisi dei linguaggi nella grande Vienna, ed. by F. Castellani, Trento 1981, pp. 65ff.

  104. 104.

    J. Rawls, Two Concepts of Rules, in Theories of Ethics, ed. by P. Foot, Oxford 1970, p. 163.

  105. 105.

    Ibid., p. 162.

  106. 106.

    Ibid.

  107. 107.

    Ibid., p. 158.

  108. 108.

    See ibid., p. 146.

  109. 109.

    See ibid.

  110. 110.

    See e.g., H. Kelsen, Reine Rechtslehre, 2nd ed., Vienna 1960, pp. 15–16, 57–58, 150ff.

  111. 111.

    See O. Weinberger, Norm und Institution. Eine Einführung in die Theorie des Rechts, pp. 67, 103

  112. 112.

    J. Rawls, A Theory of Justice, Cambridge, MA 1971, p. 55.

  113. 113.

    Cf. e.g., what R. Guastini writes in Cognitivismo ludico e regole costitutive, in La teoria generale del diritto. Problemi e tendenze attuali. Studi dedicati a Norberto Bobbio, ed. by U. Scarpelli, Comunità, Milano 1983, p. 170.

  114. 114.

    J. Rawls, A Theory of Justice, p. 55. My emphasis.

  115. 115.

    See J. R. Searle, Speech Acts, p. 51.

  116. 116.

    R. Guastini, Op. cit., p. 171.

  117. 117.

    G. Carcaterra, Le norme costitutive, Milano 1974, pp. 60–61.

  118. 118.

    Ibid., pp. 100, 106. On this cf. G. Azzoni, Il concetto di condizione nella tipologia delle regole, Padova 1988, pp. 55–56, 61ff.

  119. 119.

    For a critique of Carcaterra’s idea that constitutive rules immediately produce the object they relate to, see R. Guastini, Teoria delle regole costitutive, in Rivista internazionale di filosofia del diritto, 1983, pp. 563–564.

  120. 120.

    The correlation between “is” and “ought” here affirmed is similar to the correlation between Sein and Sollen of which Amedeo Conte speaks in connection with the “eidetico-constitutive deontic rules” (the Sein of what they regulate is determined by the Sollen of the rules themselves, which are constitutive for that very reason).

  121. 121.

    O. Weinberger, Institutionentheorie und insitutionalistischer Rechtspositivismus, p. 149.

  122. 122.

    Cf. G. Di Bernardo, Il ruolo delle regole costitutive e prescrittive nella costruzione della realtà sociale, in Nuova civiltà delle macchine, 1985, no. 3–4, p. 38.

  123. 123.

    O. Weinberger, Verfassungstheorie vom Standpunkt des neuen Institutionalismus, in Archiv für Rechts- und Sozialphilosophie, 1990, p. 100.

  124. 124.

    Ibid., p. 104.

  125. 125.

    Ibid.

  126. 126.

    Ibid.

  127. 127.

    O. Weinberger, Soziologie und normative Institutionentheorie. Überlegungen zu Helmut Schelskys Institutionentheorie vom Standpunkt der normativistischen Institutionenontologie, p. 192

  128. 128.

    See F. Alberoni, Movimento e istituzione. Teoria generale, Bologna 1981, e.g., pp. 223ff.

  129. 129.

    L. Wittgenstein, On Certainty, § 519, p. 68e

  130. 130.

    Cf. N. MacCormick, Institutions, Arrangements and Practical Information, pp. 73ff.

  131. 131.

    O. Weinberger, Ontologie, Hermeneutik und der Begriff des geltenden Rechts, p. 118. See also O. Weinberger, Institutionentheorie und institutionalistischer Rechtspositivismus, pp. 151–152.

  132. 132.

    O. Weinberger, Soziologie und normative Institutionentheorie, p. 191.

  133. 133.

    O. Weinberger, Verfassungstheorie vom Standpunkt des neuen Institutionalismus, p. 104. And this is one of the points on which the Czech author takes his distance from Kelsen (cf. e.g., H. Kelsen, Hauptprobleme der Staatsrechtslehre, entwickelt aus der Lehre vom Rechtssatze, Tübingen 1911, p. 202).

  134. 134.

    O. Weinberger, Die formal-finalistische Handlungstheorie und das Strafrecht, now in Id., Recht, Institution und Rechtspolitik, p. 132.

  135. 135.

    See e.g., J. Binder, Zur Lehre vom Rechtsbegriff, in Logos, vol. 18, 1929, pp. 1–35

  136. 136.

    See e.g., K. Olivecrona, Law as Fact, Copenhagen 1939, p. 14, according to which the binding force of law is said to be “a certain feeling of being bound by the law”, emphasis in original. For an opposite view, M. Oakeshott, On Human Conduct, pp. 155–156.

  137. 137.

    H. Kantorowicz, The Definition of Law, ed. by A. H. Campbell, Cambridge 1958, p. 16, emphasis in original.

  138. 138.

    L. Wittgenstein, Bemerkungen über die Grundsätze der Mathematik, ed. by G. E. M. Anscombe, R. Rhees and G. H. Von Wright, Frankfurt am Main 1989, pp. 328–329. English translation mimne, emphasis in original.

  139. 139.

    G. Fassò, La storia come esperienza giuridica, Milan 1953, pp. 60–61.

  140. 140.

    H. Arendt, On Violence, in Id., Crises of the Republic, Harmondsworth 1972, p. 157.

  141. 141.

    Stendhal, La chartreuse de Parme, Paris 1964, p. 147.

  142. 142.

    G. Di Bernardo, Il ruolo delle regole costitutive e prescrittive nella costruzione della realtà sociale, pp. 37–38. See also G. Di Bernardo, Le regole dell’azione sociale, Milan 1983, p. 181.

  143. 143.

    M. Livolsi, Identità e progetto. L’attore sociale nella società contemporanea, Firenze 1987, p. 139.

  144. 144.

    See A. Pizzorno, Sul confronto intertemporale delle utilità, in Stato e mercato, April 1986, p. 15.

  145. 145.

    Ibid., p. 14.

  146. 146.

    L. Wittgenstein, Bemerkungen über die Grundlagen der Mathematik, p. 249. English translation mine.

  147. 147.

    See J. Habermas, Vorlesungen zu einer sprachtheoretischen Grundlegung der Soziologie, p. 14.

  148. 148.

    Cf. C. M. Yablon, Law and Metaphysics, in The Yale Law Journal, 1987, pp. 613–636; J. Bjarup, Kripke’s Case. Some Remarks on Rules, their Interpretation and Application, in Rechtstheorie, 1988, pp. 39–49; F. Schauer, Rules and the Rule-Following Argument, in Canadian Journal of Law and Jurisprudence, 1990, pp. 187–318.

  149. 149.

    L. Wittgenstein, Bemerkungen über die Grundlagen der Mathematik, pp. 322–323. English translation mine.

  150. 150.

    J. Habermas, Vorlesungen zu einer sprachtheoretischen Grundlegung der Soziologie, p. 13.

  151. 151.

    See ibid., p. 70.

  152. 152.

    See P. Winch, Popper and Scientific Method in Social Sciences, in The Philosophy of Karl Popper, ed. by P. A. Schilpp, La Salle, IL 1974, pp. 894ff.

  153. 153.

    See e.g., J. Binder, Der Idealismus als Grundlage der Staatsphilosophie, in Zeitschrift für Deutsche Kulturphilosophie, 1935, p. 151; K. Larenz, Sittlichkeit und Recht. Untersuchungen um Geschichte des deutschen Rechtsdenken und um Sittenlehre, in Reich und Recht in der deutschen Philosophie, ed. by K. Larenz, Stuttgart and Berlin 1943, pp. 379–380; A. Gehlen, Urmensch und Spätkultur. Philosophische Ergebnisse und Aussagen, Bonn 1950, pp. 233ff.; H. G. Gadamer, Wahrheit und Methode. Grundzüge ener philosophischen Hermeneutik, in Id., Gesammelte Werke, vol. 1, Tübingen 1986, pp. 276ff.

  154. 154.

    M. Bovero, Identità individuali e collettive, in Ricerche politiche due. Identità, interessi e scelte collettive, ed. by M. Bovero, Milan 1983, p. 49.

  155. 155.

    Ibid., p. 51.

  156. 156.

    On this point cf. R. M. Hare, The Language of Morals, p. 166. Cf. also B. Williams, Morality. An Introduction to Ethics, London 1976, Chapter 6.

  157. 157.

    Max Weber speaks of the “decisive difference” between legal rules and conventional rules in moving from dealing with the rules of Skat to the norms of law, though without clarifying what the difference consists in (see M. Weber, R. Stammlers Überwindung der materialistischen Geschichtsauffassung, in Id., Gesammelte Aufsätze zur Wissenschaftslehre, ed. by J. Winckelmann, 8th ed., Tübingen 1988, p. 343). The need to distinguish at any rate the specific nature of the institution of the “State” by comparison with such an institution as bridge, tennis, a Church or a club is however stressed by A. Passerin d’Entrèves, La dottrina dello Stato, pp. 184–189

  158. 158.

    J. Habermas, Vorlesungen zu einer sprachtheoretischen Grundlegung der Soziologie, in Id., Vorstudien und Ergänzungen zur Theorie des kommunikativen Handelns, Frankfurt am Main 1984, pp. 74–75. Translation mine.

  159. 159.

    L. Wittgenstein, Philosophical Grammar, ed. by R. Rhees, English translation by A. Kenny, Berkely, CA and Los Angeles, CA 1978, p. 192, and compare L. Wittgenstein, Philosophische Grammatik, ed. by R. Rhees, Frankfurt am Main 1983, para. 140, p. 192. See also ibid., p. 193: “Die Sprache ist für uns ein Kalkül; sie ist durch die Sprachhandlungen charakterisiert. Woher die Bedeutung der Sprache? Kann man sagen: ‘Ohne Sprache könnten wir uns nicht miteinander verständigen’? Nein. Der Fall ist nicht dem analog: Ohne das Telefon könnten wir nicht von Europa nach Amerika sprechen. Wohl aber kann man sagen: ‘Ohne den Mund könnten sich die Menschen nicht verständigen’. Der Begriff der Sprache dagegen liegt im Begriff der Verständigung” (emphasis in original).

  160. 160.

    Cf., among others, H. Coing, Vom Sinngehalt des Rechts, in Die ontologische Begründung des Rechts, ed. by A. Kaufmann, Bad Homburg 1965, pp. 33ff.

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    Prof. Massimo La Torre

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    Prof. Massimo La Torre

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La Torre, M. (2010). Law as Institution. In: Law as Institution. Law and Philosophy Library, vol 90. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4020-6607-8_4

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