Reflections on the Methodological Issues of the Sociology of Law

Abstract

The general focus of this paper is on the methodological limitations of the sociology of law in capturing the law's`truth' as its practitioners experience it. The paper starts with arguing that the law does not have a monolithic 'truth'. Some aspects of its 'truth' are produced through its own recursively sealed operations, while its other aspects are generated with reference to empirically grounded knowledge, which potentially links the discourses of law and sociology. Notwithstanding this discursive kinship, the sociological studies of the law's internal processes cause difficulties even to those scholars who are versed in substantive law. To expound this problem, the sociology of law is compared with medical sociology and attention is drawn to the way sociology copes with the`truth' of medicine. The final part of the paper initiates a quest for possible solutions to the methodological problems of the sociology of law by placing them in the context of the ongoing conflicts and competitions of the field of science.

Sociology of law and the problem of normative closing the discourse

“…46 While lawyers can challenge and problematize the sociological fi ndings and perspective as both sociology and law operate with similar conceptual apparatus (social control, order, regulation, rule ...) sociologists can not challenge and problematize the law because they can not get into the legal discourse. 47 Th e nature of the legal discourse always includes some terms and expressions of general discourse that are simultaneously interested in the sociological discourse, but these same words and phrases bound to the structure of legal discourse -linguistic and logical structure of meaning -with which these concepts gain a legal, and not a sociological reference in the general discourse. In the Bosnian context that is the case with the concept of the "constituent peoples".…”

Sociologija prava i problem normativnog zatvaranja pravnog diskursa

“…Nešto blaži stav gaje oni pravnici koje zanima "pravnička sociologija prava", odnosno koji priznaju da se sociologija prava može biti od koristi pravu kroz vršenje statističkih istraživanja ili kroz davanje odgovora na određena činjenična pitanja. 34 Za razliku od pravnika (s izuzetkom onih koji zastupaju integralistička gledišta) koji obično staju sa ovim kritikama, pravni sociolozi nastoje da prevladaju problem određujući zadatak sociologije prava da zauzme i internu perspektivu, bilo kroz istraživanje pravne prakse (unutrašnjih operacija i praktičnog iskustva pravnika) 35 , kroz primjenu unutrašnjih metoda saznanja prava 36 kroz uzimanje za predmet samoopisa sistema uključujući i samorefl eksiju pravne prakse 37 , te kroz kontekstualno opisivanje i objašnjavanje odnosa prava sa drugim dimenzijama društvenog života: ekomonijom, politikom, globalizacijom, društvenom integracijom i sl. 38 Istoj svrsi služe i nastojanja da se sociologija prava otvori kritičkoj samorefl eksiji 39 ili da se rekonfi gurira kao multidisciplinarno polje istraživanja u kojemu bi se susretali i sociolozi i pravnici.…”

“…47 Dok pravnici mogu osporavati i problematizirati sociološke nalaze i perspektivu budući da i sociologija i pravo operiraju sa sličnim konceptualnim aparatom (društvena kontrola, poredak, regulacija, pravila…) sociolozi ne mogu osporavati i problematizirati pravo jer ne mogu prodrijeti u pravni diskurs. 48 Diglosivna priroda pravnog diskursa uvijek uključuje i neke pojmove i izraze iz općeg diskursa za koje se istovremeno zanima i sociološki diskurs, ali iste ove pojmove i izraze uvezuje u strukturu pravnog diskursa -jezičko-logičku strukturu značenja -čime ovi pojmovi dobijaju pravnu, a ne sociološku referencu u samom općem diskursu. U bosanskohercegovačkom kontekstu to je slučaj sa konceptom "konstitutivnih naroda".…”

Theorizing the penality of sentencing in international criminal trials

“…Alternatively, the transformative or expressive force of legalized punishment may be conceived as a measure of the extent to which the infliction of punishment goes beyond censure in its capacity to convey to citizens that the behaviour with which it deals is morally blameworthy. This approach is dependent on directing the development of theory away from the notion of legal closure (Cotterrell, 1998;Nelken, 1998;Banakar, 2000) by permitting interpretations which might allow us to make the link between sentencing law and principles as normative representations of moral principles, and the existence of forms of expressed morality in civil society as they exist in notions of communitarianism (Henham, 2003b).…”