Erasmus Universiteit Rotterdam [ Erasmus University home page | Dept. of Philosophy home page ]
 
 
 

Aldus sprak Salomo. Over de Amerikaanse verkiezingen en constitutionele krisisinterventie

Gijs van Oenen
In: Krisis 2/1, 2001, p. 7-23
 
 

Summary  "Thus spoke Solomon. On the American presidential elections and constitutional crisis intervention"

The article analyzes how the dialectic of politicisation and juridification following the American presidential elections of november 2000 tended to annihilate the discretionary space available to legal and political officials. Mainstream legal philosophy fails to understand the paradoxical ‘twist’ in the logic of this crisis, a twist that is related to what Jacques Derrida has called the ‘mystical foundation’ of authority. It is concluded that adjudication, especially in the constitutional domain, always has a necessarily deceptive dimension. Legal authority should not aim to hide or mask this element of deception, but rather convince us to put up with it, for the time being – as exemplified in the famous Solomonic judgment, properly understood..
 
 
 

You can also go: