摘要
法律解释的一个重要任务是明确相关法律规则中的一般词项的所指,因此理应能够得到关于所指如何确定的一般理论的指导。然而,语言哲学中已有的三种指称理论(描述指称理论、直接指称理论与意向性理论)都难以直接运用到法律领域中。这或者是由于它们本身所存在的局限,或者是由于法律实践作为一种独特的交流活动所具有的区别性特征。一般法律词项的所指是由立法意图、客观知识与语言惯习共同决定的。其中,语言惯习的作用是限制性的,立法意图与客观知识的作用是指引性的。在所指确定的过程中,立法意图提供所指识别的标准,客观知识明确所指的范围。
Legislators normally adopt general legal terms to convey behavioral standards for social in- dividuals and judicial standards for judges at the same time. In order to apply these rules expressed in general terms, people involved need to determine whether the particular object they encounter could be counted as an instance of the relative general terms or not. Although in many cases this kind of de- termination is easy, it could become and often do become a difficult problem and legal interpretation may show up as a reliable method to solve this problem. Because of this, an important task of legal interpretation is to determine the referent of general legal terms within legal rules, which leads to the expectation of the role of general philosophical theories in guiding the endeavor of the interpretation of legal rules. However, this expectation is not fulfilled since there is no consensus on how to determine the referent of a word in the philosophy of language, and none of the three primary referential theories （ description theory, direct reference theory, and intentionality theory） can be applied in the domain of law without dramatic alteration, which can be attributed to their own shortcomings or the distinctive feature of legal practice as a kind of communication activity. The referent of a general legal term is determined neither by public descriptions as the description theory may suggest, nor by the essential attributes of things that some authors influenced by the direct reference theory have suggested, or sole- ly by speaker＇ s intention as some intentionalists have suggested. The referent of a general legal term is jointly determined by legislative intent, objective knowledge, and linguistic habitus. These deter- minants have different roles to play in the process of referent-determination, that is, legislative intent provides the criterion, objective knowledge defines the scope, and linguistic habitus excludes unfit conclusions.
出处
《法学研究》
CSSCI
北大核心
2016年第5期108-129,共22页
Chinese Journal of Law
基金
国家社科基金青年项目(15CFX005)的研究成果
关键词
法律解释
一般法律词项
语言惯习
立法意图
legal interpretation, general legal terms, linguistic habitus, legislative intent
作者简介
山东大学法学院讲师
