EXC 212 A01 - Legal and Theological Doctrines (“Dogmatics”) as Symbolic Staging of Normativity

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Description

Legal and theological doctrine (“dogmatics”) constitutes a special manifestation of political-legal and religious normativity. Only the immanent functions of such dogmatics (the reduction of normative complexity, stabilisation of normative expectations) have been well researched, not their social function and effect. If one turns one’s attention to the connection between normative claims for legitimacy and form, dogmatics nevertheless appears as one – specifically western – “staging” of law and religion in the shape of scholarly knowledge. In particular, doctrinal propositions have, namely, despite their normative form, a “descriptive meaning” (Hans Kelsen). This results in a particular potential for legitimacy, because normativity, which is represented as clear and capable of being true and thus in principle, capable of being rationally founded, seems for this reason to be legitimate. In addition there is the fact that doctrines form a crucial factor in the creation and stabilisation of the autonomy of law and religion. For making something an academic doctrine transforms the normative – despite its rationality – into epistemological arcana that have to be managed by a group of experts who are allowed to claim the appropriate trust in advance.