Conceptualization of "public order" within Czech legal style

Result code in IS VaVaI

<a href="https://www.isvavai.cz/riv?ss=detail&h=RIV%2F00216224%3A14220%2F21%3A00119389" target="_blank" >RIV/00216224:14220/21:00119389 - isvavai.cz</a>

Result on the web

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DOI - Digital Object Identifier

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Result language

angličtina

Original language name

Conceptualization of "public order" within Czech legal style

Original language description

In an ongoing project, we explore the use of social representations approach (Moscovici 1961/1976, 2008) in studying conceptualization in law. One of the concepts we explore is that of “veřejný pořádek” ("public order"). Public order is a vague legal concept and as such it lacks legal definition and needs to be interpreted and re- interpreted in relation to context. While the interpretation of vague legal concepts is essentially in the hands of persons applying the rule containing them, some of them have inescapable links to social realities. It would seem that using public order in legal argumentation requires understanding that is far from strictly formalistically legal. Is that the case for Czech legal environment and how far should a judge go in order to understand the concept in order to apply it properly? In a recent case the Czech Supreme Administrative Court relied on the concept of public order when making a decision on gender indication in a person’s national identification number. The court indicated that for the national identification number to bear a different than assigned-at-birth gender identification when the identified person has not yet undergone complete gender affirming surgery would be (among other reasons) contrary to public order. The argumentation leading to this conclusion seems to show clear argumentative gaps when it comes to the steps taken to determine the content of the concept of public order, as the court practically entirely relied on personal insight of the judge making that decision. In this paper, we report the findings of a part of wider complex research related to social representations approach in understanding vague legal concepts. In the course of our research, we have explored our participants’ understanding of public order in a very similar setting to the one presented in this case. Their understanding seems to suggest that although public order points towards basic values of a given society, some of our participants suggest that it is a concept whose interpretation remains strictly legal, confining the judge to – sometimes incomplete – information provided by formal legal sources or legal doctrine. While such a confinement may result in weak argumentation, we believe it may also be explainable in terms of normativistic and formalistic tendencies present in the Czech legal culture.

Czech name

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Czech description

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Type

O - Miscellaneous

CEP classification

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OECD FORD branch

50501 - Law

Project

<a href="/en/project/GA20-10171S" target="_blank" >GA20-10171S: Methods of social representation in analysis of legal concepts</a><br>

Continuities

P - Projekt vyzkumu a vyvoje financovany z verejnych zdroju (s odkazem do CEP)

Publication year

2021

Confidentiality

S - Úplné a pravdivé údaje o projektu nepodléhají ochraně podle zvláštních právních předpisů