The Exclusionary Role of Law. Revisiting Joseph Raz's Account

PAULA GAIDO

Londres

Simposio; UCL Legal Philosophy Forum; 2014

University College London

Joseph Raz calls our attention about law as a specific source of reasons for action. For him, in understanding the nature of law it is crucial to grasp the conceptual commitments undertaken by those who adopt the point of view of law, namely the participant's perspective. From the participant´s perspective, law is necessarily related to the idea of practical authority, and legal norms are understood as protected reasons. Now, it is not fully clear how this picture matches with some of Raz´s theses regarding how the law should be interpreted and when it should be applied. Raz argues simultaneously for the exclusionary role of law and the court´s conceptual possibility to change the law and justify their decisions based on considerations of justice. In this paper, I would like to discuss these tensions. More specifically, I will be interested in the critical analysis of Raz´s theses in order to: (i) determine their scope; and (ii) assess their plausibility.