Reasonableness and Biolaw

There can undoubtedly be a procedural approach to reasonableness. Alexy argues that conditions such as taking “all relevant factors” into account or “putting all relevant factors together in a correct way” (see Alexy 2009) are necessary for reasonableness to be pursued—and a fortiori achieved. In the particular field of biolaw, Faralli argues somehow similarly that reasonableness can only be reached when norms proceed from a “shared method of discussion” (rather than from an “antecedent doctrine”) and if they are based on the assumption that dilemmas faced by biolaw can not be expressed nor analyzed in terms of truth and or falseness but only pretend to be “adequately argued and justified” (see Faralli 2009). At any rate, a non-procedural (eg., substantial) approach of reasonableness may well be said to be quite unlikely in early 21st century European academic settings, for natural law theories articulated around substantial standards of validity are readily said to be out of—scientific—fashion. Indeed, it would have been surprising to hear speakers and the Reasonableness and the Law conference argue that the concept of reasonableness was a promising ground for validating certain conducts and norms as “reasonable,” and invalidating others as “unreasonable.” However, the frontier between a procedural and a substantial approach of reasonableness is not easy to draw. Consequently, and despite the above recalled procedural approach to reasonableness, the concept sets the legal theorist on a slippery slope towards axiological assessments of legal cases—a reason for which it will be argued it is best relinquished.