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Toward an Informal Account of Legal Interpretation offers a viable account of law, judicial decision-making, and legal interpretation that is as fresh as it is familiar. The author expertly challenges the dominant mode of formalist theorizing and proposes an explanatory account of legal interpretation that can profitably be understood as an 'informal' intervention. Such an informal approach has no truck with either the claims of the formalists (i.e., that law is something separate from ideology) or those of the anti-formalists (i.e., that law is nothing other than ideological posturing). Hutchinson insists that, when understood properly, legal interpretation is an applied exercise in law-and-ideology; it is both constrained and unconstrained in equal measure. In developing this informalist account through a sustained application of the 'no vehicles in the park' rule, this book is wide-ranging in theoretical scope and substance, but also accessible and practical in style

This work draws from accounts on the nature and legal effects of soft law instruments in EU and international law with the ultimate aim to construct a theoretical framework for recognition of EU competition soft law—guidelines, communications, notices, and the like—in the judicial discourse of national courts of the European Union. "Recognition" is used to encompass instances in which the national judiciary either explicitly interprets—that is, agrees or disagrees with—the content of competition soft instruments, or treats their substance in a roundabout, implicit way—without explicit reference to soft law in the judgment proper. This second option is called "the persuaded judiciary scenario." Importantly, a foundational assumption of the current work is that courts do not transform soft law into hard law when subjecting the former to judicial interpretation/recognition. This Article also takes issue with the fact that CJEU preliminary rulings on competition soft law disputes originating in Member States have thus far exhibited a rather resistant attitude to soft law. The supranational judiciary has, to a large extent, refused to interpret soft law because of its lack of binding force. The possibility that national courts adopt a similar approach in the currently decentralized competition enforcement system is thus not discounted, but is seen as undesirable for two important reasons.

In this article, I will first explore Washington's existing law, both statutory and judicial, on statutory interpretation. I will then evaluate the mechanisms for construing statutes derived from common law and legislative sources. Finally, I will recommend a new paradigm for statutory construction so that legislative intent may be more accurately conveyed to the courts, abandoning many of the time-encrusted canons in favor of principles of interpretation adhering more specifically to the legislature's actual statutory language.

Prototype theory is a semantic theory according to which the membership of conceptual categories is based not on a list of criterial features, but rather on the similarity to the most representative member of the category. Consequently, conceptual categories may lack classical definitions and rigid boundaries. This article supports the claims, already made by other scholars working in the field, that prototype theory may greatly augment our understanding of legal (i.e. statutory, judicial) interpretation. Legal provisions are traditionally written as classical definitions, but they are rarely applied that way. Statutory concepts tend to be interpreted with a great deal of flexibility, using a wide array of extra-textual factors. This is especially true for the case law of the Court of Justice of the European Union, which has to deal with the challenges of the multilingual, supranational law of the European Union. ; Teoria prototypu jest teorią semantyczną, zgodnie z którą przynależność do kategorii pojęciowych nie opiera się na zestawie określonych cech, lecz na podobieństwie do najbardziej reprezentatywnego egzemplarza danej kategorii. W związku z tym kategorie pojęciowe mogą nie poddawać się klasycznemu definiowaniu, a ich granice bywają rozmyte. Artykuł ten wspiera twierdzenia innych autorów, że teoria prototypów może znacząco pogłębić nasze rozumienie interpretacji prawniczej. Przepisy prawne są tradycyjnie formułowane jak klasyczne definicje, jednak rzadko są stosowane w ten sposób. Pojęcia ustawowe są często interpretowane z dużą elastycznością, przy wykorzystaniu szerokiej palety czynników pozatekstowych. Jest to szczególnie aktualne w przypadku orzecznictwa Trybunału Sprawiedliwości Unii Europejskiej, który stoi przed wyzwaniem stosowania wielojęzycznego, ponadnarodowego prawa Unii Europejskiej.

The European Convention Human Rights system, despite being the most effective system in providing individual protection of civil and political rights, is currently facing numerous problems. One of the biggest problems is the European Court of Human Rights overload. The expansion of the Court's caseload can be attributed to a combination of several factors one of which is the extensive judicial interpretation of Convention rights to a variety of claims, which at the inception of the system states were not initially intent upon addressing. As a human rights treaty where numerous provisions have been drafted with a lack of precision the Convention is subject to interpretation that is done by the Court since the judges have to interpret and define law in concrete situations, and not just apply it. For that reason the Court has developed numerous principles of interpretation of the Convention and this paper looks at the most important ones. The interpretative principles of the Court can be divided in two groups, related to the direction in which the judicial creativity led. The first group represents judicial self-restraint principles of interpretation where the judges used one of the four following principles: intentionalism, textualism, margin of appreciation or the doctrine of fourth instance. On the other side, the judicial activist methods of interpretation, as used by the judges' of the Court are the living instrument doctrine or evolutive interpretation, the doctrine of effectiveness or innovative interpretation, and the doctrine of an autonomous concept. This paper will look at all those principles as well as at the negative consequences of the inconsistency of their use. ; Europska konvencija za zaštitu ljudskih prava najstariji je i najučinkovitiji sustav za zaštitu ljudskih prava u svijetu. No, konvencijski sustav nije bez problema. Europski sud za ljudska prava, zadužen za ispitivanje individualnih (ali i međudržavnih) tužbi, preplavljen je zahtjevima pojedinaca koji tvrde da im je povrijeđeno neko od ...

Introduction : sharing interpretive power -- Judicial supremacy, dialogue theory, and coordinate interpretation -- Explaining the hostility to coordinate interpretation -- The separation of powers in Canada : partial agency or watertight compartments? -- The separation of powers in Canada : 'fusion' or 'ambivalence' -- The ambivalent judicial role in the separation of powers -- Legal pluralism after the Supreme Court decides -- Judicial remedies and the separation of power -- Conclusion : some final words about the 'final say'

The question driving this thesis is how should the separation of federal judicial power, derived from Chapter III of the Australian Constitution, be interpreted to best achieve the independence and impartiality of federal courts? The interpretation of Chapter III is as hotly debated as it is fundamentally important. Two key viewpoints have emerged in this debate: formalism and functionalism. A formalist test – strictly separating government powers according to definition – limits the permissible powers of federal courts. A functionalist test – hinging validity on whether a power is incompatible with institutional independence and integrity – limits the powers of State courts and of judges in their personal capacities ('personae designatae'). A rare point of consensus between the two viewpoints is that the separation of judicial power derived from Chapter III should be interpreted in a manner that achieves its core purpose. This thesis identifies this purpose as judicial independence and impartiality and queries which interpretive approach can best achieve this aim, with a view to contributing to contemporary debates and guiding future developments in the area. The central argument of the thesis is that a new, hybrid approach called purposive formalism presents a legitimate and preferable interpretation of Chapter III, better able to achieve judicial independence and impartiality than either the existing formalist or functionalist tests. The thesis tests the strengths and weaknesses of formalist, functionalist and purposive formalist interpretations of Chapter III in two case studies. The first case study concerns powers conferred on federal courts under the anti-terrorism control order provisions of the Commonwealth Criminal Code (the 'Code'), and contrasts formalist and purposive formalist approaches to assessing the Chapter III validity of these provisions. The second case study concerns similar powers conferred on judges personae designatae under the anti-terrorism preventative detention order provisions of the Code, and assesses the relative strengths and weaknesses of purposive formalism and the functionalist incompatibility test in this context. The study as a whole reveals serious weaknesses in the existing approaches. Purposive formalism is consistently supported, not as a perfect or ideal approach, but certainly as a preferable interpretation of Chapter III better able to achieve the independence and impartiality of federal courts.

Canons of construction serve as a set of ground rules that judges rely on in interpreting statutes. Substantive canons of construction, in particular, are principles and presumptions that point judges in a specific policy direction in order to serve underlying public values. Many of these substantive canons share a common justification: judges have developed them to mitigate threats of irreversible harm to vulnerable and underrepresented interests and to incentivize clarity in the legislative process. This Article argues that environmental interests—the interests of present and future generations in maintaining ecological conditions that support life—merit similar protection. Therefore, judges should employ an environmental canon of construction: whenever possible, statutes must be read in a manner that best promotes ecological integrity and sustainability for present and future generations. The Article examines several common substantive canons and concludes that environmental interests and values justify a similar canon. An environmental canon of construction also finds support in the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA), which provides that "the policies, regulations, and public laws of the United States shall be interpreted and administered in accordance with" the environmental policies listed in the statute. Recognizing a substantive environmental canon would place ecological concerns on the same level, legally and rhetorically, with other fundamental rights and concerns—granting legitimacy to the consideration of environmental impacts in judicial reasoning and bringing our legal system in line with scientific understanding of our role and responsibility in an ecologically interdependent world.