CORE LEGAL THEORY SEMINAR: José Antonio MAGALHAES (ICI-Berlin) on "Speculative Legal Theory and World (Dis-)order" (Brussels: VUB, 23 APRIL 2025, 14:00-15u30) [HYBRID]

 

Speculative Legal Theory and World (Dis-)order

José Antonio Magalhães is a juridico-political theorist and currently a research fellow at ICI-Berlin.  

 Abstract:

The world we thought we lived in, built on eras of diplomacy among human and non-human peoples, seems to be falling apart in the sway of technological acceleration, ecological collapse and geopolitical turmoil. In times of cosmic stability, the work of the jurist became either technical, analytic, interpretive, critical or deconstructive, taking for granted fundamental juridical concepts as well as the world-order they maintain. When, however, worlds themselves are up for grabs, jurists are called upon to create or find the concepts necessary for unforeseen world-arrangements. That implies a mode of jurisprudence different in nature from the ones mentioned above, one in which we cannot take for granted that we know what law is. We call it speculative legal theory. We will explore some basic definitions of SLT as opposed to "legal correlationism", as well as some of its most urgent contemporary lines of research. 

Place and time:

VUB, room C4.09, 14:00-15:30 

RSVP with Rodrick dot Van dot der dot smissen at vub dot be. A hybrid link is available upon request.