After Law

Law is the most sacred fetish of our time. From radicals to conservatives, there is no militant, activist or thinker who would consider doing without it. But the history of our fascination with law is long and complex, and reaches deeper into our culture than we might think. In After Law, Laurent de Sutter takes us on a journey to uncover the sources of our fascination. He shows that at a certain moment in our history a choice was made to treat law as a decisive feature of civilization, but this choice was neither obvious nor necessary. Other political, social, religious or cultural possibilities could have been chosen instead - from ancient Egypt to Mesopotamia, from medieval Japan to China, from Islam to Judaism, other cultures have devised sophisticated tools to help people live together without having to deal with norms, rules and principles. This is a lesson worth reflecting on, especially at a time when the rule of law and the functioning of justice are increasingly showing their sinister side - and their impotence. Is there life beyond law?

Auteur

Laurent de Sutter is Professor of Legal Theory at Vrije Universiteit Brussel.

Contenu

Translator's Note xi Foreword by Avital Ronell xiii

PRELUDE 1
. Law

1: NOMOS 5
Isonomia - Thesmos - Rhra -
Nem - Philosophy - Order - Polis -
This - Phusis - . Anomia

INTERLUDE 1 19
. Chaos.

2: DUM 23
. Hammurabi - . Mirum - . Dum

• . mma - . Prophesy - . ma -
  . Kittum - . Model - . Akum - .
  Understanding

INTERLUDE 2 35
. Code

3: IUS 39
. Rogatio - . Ius - . Fas - . Iura -
. Nexum - . Civitas - . Corpus - .
Iurisprudentia - . Institutes - . Disruption

INTERLUDE 3 53
. Case

4: LEX 57
. Leges - . Lectio - . Cicero - .
Uinculum - . Nomos - . Perfectio - .
Schola - . Norm - . Morality - . Synthesis

INTERLUDE 4 71
. E. Being

5: FIQH 75
. Oumma - . Sharia - . Fiqh - .
Qiy - . Sh'i - . Fur - . Taql -
. Djinn - . Tariq - . Doubt

INTERLUDE 5 89
. Man

6: LI 93
. Confucius - . Li - . Relation - .
Ren - . Xing - . Fa - . Shang - .
Xun - . Form - . The pear tree

INTERLUDE 6 107
. Sanction

7: GIRI 111
. Ritsury - . Tang - . Shoku - .
Horitsu - . Giri - . Emotion - . On -
. Assessment - . Kyaku - . Rei

INTERLUDE 7 125
. Reason

8: DHARMA 129
. Smriti - . Sutra - . Trivarga - .
Pramana - . Arya - . Abjection - .
Artha - . Varna - . Manu - . Asoka

INTERLUDE 8 14
. Judgement

9: MA 147
. Ma - . kh - . Isfet - .
Oasien - . Communication - . Tomb -
. Ba - . ja - . Hou - . Nefer

INTERLUDE 9 159
. Politics

10: AGGADAH 163
. Torah - . Halakha - . Justification

• . Maimonides - . Chaim - . Beyond
• . Pluralism - . Mishpatim - .
  Aggadah - 0. Betrayal

POSTLUDE 177
. Right

Notes 179

Index 207