LSE Research: The Moral Structure of Legal Systems, pt. 2

Part II of The Moral Structure of Legal Systems concerns a peculiar correlation: tyrannical regimes nearly always possess chaotic legal systems. Dr Kristen Rundle asks: Why?

One of the characteristic features of tyrannical regimes is their chaotic legal system. For Dr Rundle, this isn't just a case of poor legal housekeeping. The systemic disorder typically exhibited by the legal systems of despotic and transitional states occurs precisely because tyrants require forms of power that are incompatible with law.

Chaos works in the tyrant's favour. Impose a legal code that is transparent, consistent, and which does not permit retroactivity -- impose, in other words, a legal system recognisably distinct from arbitrary commands -- and the tyrant finds his urge to wield absolute power has been tied up.

Hence the so-called "rule-of-law" is the idea that we owe our obedience to the law, not the lawgiver. Such a system doesn't prescribe perfect justice, of course. But it does, crucially, impose constraints on the ambitions of the would-be tyrannical dictator.

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