法律如何构建时间?——系统理论脉络下的展开

How the Law Constructs Time:Observations Through Systems Theory

现代法律对时间的构建与社会系统的功能分化相关,社会系统与环境的区分实现了不同系统的时间维度,因此,法律系统构建时间的问题是一个在法律运作和法律理论演化中真实存在的问题。法律系统构建时间的独特性与法律的规范性预期功能具有紧密关联,法律系统的时间维度呈现为以当下为视角观察过去并指向未来的特点,而以政治目标为导向直接对未来进行“规划”的政治规范模式无法匹配法律系统一般意义上的时间塑造方式。政治决策无法恰当地实现法律系统维持规范性预期的社会功能,因此政治系统的目的式纲要无法替代法律系统以当下为视角构建的条件式纲要。系统理论对“时间”问题的考察展现了法律系统演化中可能出现的风险,这也是系统理论对法律演化问题的贡献。

The construction of time in law is closely related to modern society's functional differentiation.Only by admitting that the system can generate communication and distinction from its environment can we understand the possibility of different dimensions of time in society,and do we also recognize time is an issue in legal operation and legal evolution.The uniqueness of temporal dimension in legal system and its function of normative expectation is the description of the distinction of legal system from other systems in systems theory.Future-oriented construction of time in law cannot fulfill the legal argumentation in law and the normative stability brought by legal decisions.Politics'purposeful program has the same negative effects.Through the observation of the concept of temporality in systems theory,modern law's evolutionary value and its risks in change can be revealed,and it is also the importance of systems theory for the legal theories'evolutions.