Two "laws".

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There are two fundamental forms of law.
Or the law is fundamentally made up of two types.
There is one kind of law that is about justice - enabling coexistence.
And another one that is about securing/protecting the established power structure (ownership).
They are sometimes opposite each other. (Water rights in USA.)

Are there more than these two "laws"? What have I missed?
(I am fully aware that those in the juridical system might protest the idea that they work for the establishment, claiming only to serve justice. But have they ever really questioned the concept of inheritance?)

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@Ola,

Ola wrote:

There are two fundamental forms of law.
Or the law is fundamentally made up of two types.
There is one kind of law that is about justice - enabling coexistence.
And another one that is about securing/protecting the established power structure (ownership).
They are sometimes opposite each other. (Water rights in USA.)

Are there more than these two "laws"? What have I missed?
(I am fully aware that those in the juridical system might protest the idea that they work for the establishment, claiming only to serve justice. But have they ever really questioned the concept of inheritance?)

No, on first blush I think your categorizations should fit most concepts of 'law'.

But I'm curious: You define "justice" as that which enables coexistence? I think I'd agree - on the whole - but I don't believe I've ever heard it defined like this and am curious what all that might entail.

Thanks

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@Ola,

You are wrong, and I will be happy to try to prove you wrong...I say it all the time, and as well with this: Law is a form of rlationship...In a sense, law is a formula, and formulation of behovior... It is true for physical laws and social laws... We see certain forms played out in the power structures...Forms are structures...As forms, laws can all be turned to justice or injustice just as any other form...

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@Fido,

Fido wrote:

Law is a form of rlationship...In a sense, law is a formula, and formulation of behovior...

This is a good way to describe it. It's a relationship in that it requires other components for it to have substance; and it's also a standard applying to behavior.

But what broad 'types' are there, I think, is the question. Aside from the ones he mentions (those that enable coexistence and those that protect & secure 'ownership'), what might the others be?

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@Khethil,

Khethil wrote:

This is a good way to describe it. It's a relationship in that it requires other components for it to have substance; and it's also a standard applying to behavior.

But what broad 'types' are there, I think, is the question. Aside from the ones he mentions (those that enable coexistence and those that protect & secure 'ownership'), what might the others be?

Everything is either form or relationship...Every form is a standard..You get married..It is a form, and a formality, so there is a certain standard of behavior that comes with it...It can be a sort of power structure like law, and it can become a way of achieving justice, or denying justice...You cannot say marriage is law, and yet it is legal, and law is a form as marriage is with a certain relationship associated with it... You can get the big picture...You can see everything as two thing, and see those two things in terms of the other...Then the essential question is no longer what it is; but what it does, why it does, and why it fails, and why it cannot do later what it was once able to do... As people change, so change their form...As societies change, so change their forms...When societies change they change through a change of forms... Ideology was once a subject of study, so that Napoleon called them ideologues, talkers rather than doers.. If we as human beings will master our futures and all our futures we must master forms, grasp their significance and turn them to our benefit...Now, one man who was clearly a man of his day, of the enlightenment, Thomas Jefferson talks about forms in the Declaration of Independence...Incidentally, he was an Attorney...All we do is form... All we are is form... Law no sooner fails humanity and is torn down than it is built up again...Why??? What do people expect from the form???

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@Ola,

Ola wrote:

There is one kind of law that is about justice - enabling coexistence.
And another one that is about securing/protecting the established power structure (ownership).

I agree with you, Fido is wrong.

Law is nothing to do with a relationship between society and legislature, there is no relationship between a vast majority in society and legislature - the relationship is between courts/policy-makers and legislation/legal guidelines. One could intuit a law that governs one's own poetry laws (akin to the laws of physics) and prove them to be 'successful' in creating eligible poetry, but the relationship tends to be between the author the poem and the law, and not between the poem's law and the audience, unless the law is published as part of a conceptual poetic device. I don't think that Western democratic legal-social structure falls into the latter category - society has a relationship with the courts/policy-makers and not with the laws themselves, unless of course they work in the required fields (akin to being the poem's author).

To clarify, in the analogy:
Poem = legal guidlines
Author = Courts/policy-makers
Poetic laws = Law

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@Doobah47,

Doobah47 wrote:

I agree with you, Fido is wrong.

Law is nothing to do with a relationship between society and legislature, there is no relationship between a vast majority in society and legislature - the relationship is between courts/policy-makers and legislation/legal guidelines. One could intuit a law that governs one's own poetry laws (akin to the laws of physics) and prove them to be 'successful' in creating eligible poetry, but the relationship tends to be between the author the poem and the law, and not between the poem's law and the audience, unless the law is published as part of a conceptual poetic device. I don't think that Western democratic legal-social structure falls into the latter category - society has a relationship with the courts/policy-makers and not with the laws themselves, unless of course they work in the required fields (akin to being the poem's author).

Actually, every relationship is one on one between individuals; but it does not mean some one cannot have a relationship with a whole country, or even all of humanity... Every law is a formulation of behavior whether it is of physics or morals... Among human beings the formula is supposed to result in a good for society.

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Two "laws".

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