A Puzzle About Vagueness, Reasons, and Judicial Discretion
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 21687064 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Hrafn Asgeirsson (0000-0002-5104-0999, University of Surrey, corresponding author) |
| Year | 2022 |
| Volume | 28 |
| Issue | 3 |
| Pages | 210-234 |
| Publication date | 2022-09-01 |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Legal Theory (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 1352-3252 • E-ISSN: 1469-8048 |
| Publisher | Cambridge University Press (CUP) (PUBLISHER) |
| DOI | 10.1017/s1352325222000143 |
| OpenAlex | W4292716498 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 2 |
| References cited | 12 |
The following two theses seem both plausible and consistent: in cases where it is indeterminate whether the relevant legal language applies to the relevant set of facts, officials are not bound to decide the case one way rather than the other, but may reason either way; all reasons for action are—in some relevant sense—knowable. In this paper, I point out what I take to be a robust but unacknowledged tension between these two claims. The tension requires some careful teasing out, but the basic idea is that given certain further plausible assumptions concerning law, language, and normativity, the two claims turn out to be inconsistent. In addition to examining the sources of the tension in some detail, I also address several possible objections to my argument and discuss which of the many theses should be rejected
Discretion · Epistemology · Fuzzy logic · Indeterminate · Law and economics · Linguistics · Political science · Sociology · Vagueness · Computer Science · International Arbitration and Investment Law · Judicial and Constitutional Studies · Law · Legal principles and applications · Mathematics · Philosophy
| Citations per year | 0.67 |
|---|---|
| Citation span | 2023 - 2024 (2) |
| Highly cited | No |