Questions of “Correction”

Abstract

Since the second half of the XX century, jurisprudence, in the civil-law and common-law worlds alike, is ensnared by an apparently irresolvable problem: the problem concerning the “nature” of legal interpretation. The problem has originated a persistent, and probably endless, dispute. The persistence of the dispute is amenable to several factors. Among these factors, I claim, features the inadequacy of the terminological and conceptual apparatus that is usually put to work, while presenting the rival conceptions at stake, in dealing with the issue of “interpretive correctness” (“correct interpretations”, “wrong interpretations”, “interpretive right answers”, “interpretive wrong answers”, etc.). Section 2 provides a survey of the main factors explaining the persistence of the dispute. Section 3 accounts for the three antagonistic conceptions of legal interpretation as presented by Jorge Rodríguez, following Hart, in his monumental Teoría analítica del derecho (namely, the “noble dream”, the “nightmare”, and the “vigil”). Section 4 introduces one generic and six specific notions of interpretive correctness (to wit: ontological, methodological, ideological, judicial, doctrinal, and cultural correctness). Sections 5 to 7 analyse, compare, and evaluate the three rival conceptions from the standpoint of the several specific notions of interpretive correctness, suggesting the “nightmare” to be the only one providing an answer to the theoretical problem into question.