Homo Juridicus: On the Anthropological Function of the Law

A provocative investigation of how law shapes everyday life

In this groundbreaking work, French legal scholar Alain Supiot examines the relationship of society to legal discourse.

He argues that the law is how justice is implmented in secular society, but it is not simply a technique to be manipulated at will: it is also an expression of the core beliefs of the West. We must recognize its universalizing, dogmatic nature and become receptive to other interpretations from non-Western cultures to help us avoid the clash of civilizations.

In Homo Juridicus, Supiot deconstructs the illusion of a world that has become “flat” and undifferentiated, regulated only by supposed “laws” of science and the economy, and peopled by contract-makers driven only by the calculation of their individual interests. Such a liberal perspective is nothing but the flipside of the notion of the withering away of law and the state, promoted this time not under the banner of the struggle between classes, but rather in the name of the free competition between sovereign individuals.

Supiot’s exploration of the development of the legal subject—the individual as formed through a dense web of contracts and laws—is set to become a classic work of social theory.