Showing papers in "Modern Law Review in 1984"

The Role of Linguistics in Legal Analysis

Abstract: Legal theory has traditionally made a fairly extensive use of the philosophy of language. At a very general level it has frequently been argued that linguistic philosophy is a valuable heuristic tool for the elaboration of general questions concerning the institutional nature of law and the meaning of key legal terms. At a more substantive level it has also been claimed that linguistic methodology and the various exegetical and hermeneutic traditions of textual analysis may aid in the practical endeavour of explaining the intricacies of rule interpretation and rule application. Despite such claims, however, the role of linguistics — both historical and potential — in legal analysis has never been an object of systematic study. It is indeed something of a paradox that while problems of definition, of interpretation and of vagueness, ambiguity and polysemy generally are constantly referred to by the major theories of law, no attempt has been made to analyse the specifically linguistic basis of such problems. If one concedes that the major schools of legal thought are differentiated, as much as anything else, by the divergence of their approaches to the theory of adjudication and of law application, the absence of any encounter with linguistics might well be taken to indicate the subordination of the will to truth to the need to conceal; the privileging of ideological concerns over the pursuit of knowledge.

Contract Doesn't Live Here any More?

Abstract: “Parliament intended that Industrial Tribunals should provide a quick and cheap remedy for what it had decided were injustices in the employment sphere. The procedure was to be such that both employers and employees could present their cases without having to go to lawyers for help. Within a few years legalism has started to take over. It must be driven back if possible.”1