291321 Legal theory and digitalization (FFA 2021) (S) (WiSe 2025/2026)

The course “Legal Theory in the Digital World” explores foundational legal categories such as normativity, institutional structures, authority, interpretation, and decision-making. These concepts are first examined in their own right and then revisited in light of contemporary digital transformations. Key topics include digital manipulation as a form of behavioral influence, structural shifts in the nature of legal norms, automated enforcement mechanisms, and the distinction between legal interpretation and legal decision-making.

Course outlines

1. Preliminary issues

2. Law - fragments of a conceptual explanation

2.1 Institutionality

2.2 Normativity

2.3 Coerciveness

3. Legal theory

3.1 General introductory remarks

3.2 Different types of legal theory

3.3 Legal theory and legal dogmatics

4. Law and morality

4.1 Occupation of the same terrain

4.2 Two senses of morality

4.3 Overview of metaethics and normative ethics

4.4 Crucial mutual interactions

5. Basic conceptions of legality

5.1 Object of dispute

5.2 Non-positivism

5.3 Positivism

6. The specific purpose of law

7. Interactions between law, legal theory and digitalization

8. Institutionality

8.1 General introductory remarks

8.2 Law making

8.3. Law enforcement

8.4. Law applying

9. Normativity

9.1 General introductory remarks

9.2 Granularity

9.3 Embedding

10 Coerciveness

10.1 General introductory remarks

10.2 Two prima facie instantiations of coercion

10.3 Surveillance technologies

10.4 Manipulation

11. Statutory law and digitalization

11.1 Citizen participation and digitalization

11.2 Legislative process and digitalization

11.3 Controlling the impact of legislation and digitalization

12. Judge-made law and digitalization

12.1 Judicial interpretation and digitalization

12.2 Judicial lawmaking and digitalization

12.3 The “Victor Project” of the Brazilian Supreme Court

13. Digital tech’s impacts on the nature of law