The cunning of legal pluralism

Negotiating monism and pluralism in Buddhist law

Datos Bibliográficos

ID8253237
AutoresBenjamin Schonthal (0000-0002-3091-6576, University of Otago, autor de correspondencia)
Año2022
Volumen54
Número1
Páginas31-47
Fecha de publicación2022-01-02
Peer ReviewedSí
Open AccessNo
TipoARTICLE
RevistaLegal Pluralism and Critical Social Analysis (JOURNAL)
Identificadores de la revistaISSN: 2770-6869 • E-ISSN: 2770-6877
EditorialInforma UK Limited (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1080/07329113.2022.2040141
OpenAlexW4221015358
IdiomaEN
Citas recibidas3
Referencias citadas27

Arguments about normative unity and multiplicity dominate a great deal of scholarship on legal pluralism. Yet such arguments are not only advanced by academics, nor are they value-free descriptions of law. Notions of legal unity and multiplicity may also be deployed strategically by the legal actors that scholars study in order to advance their own interests, or criticize others. This article considers this fact, along with its methodological consequences, by highlighting conceits of unity and multiplicity as they operate within Buddhist monastic law in Sri Lanka. Drawing on Buddhist legal texts in Sri Lanka’s main vernacular language of Sinhala as well as the Theravāda Buddhist liturgical language of Pāli, this article illuminates competing theories of legal monism and pluralism operating within traditions of Theravāda Buddhist monastic law. In so doing, it explores the complex politics—of averring or critiquing the self-presentation of legal authorities—that necessarily accompanies the study of religious law and other forms of non-state law

Buddhism · Comparative law · Epistemology · Legal pluralism · Legal realism · Monism · Political science · Sociology · Theology · Vernacular · Indigenous Peoples' Rights and Law · International Law and Human Rights · Judicial and Constitutional Studies · Law · Philosophy