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Multisensory Law Does Neither Amount to Visual Law Nor to Multimedia Law

Colette R. Brunschwig

2011-03-31 15:04

In his posting of December 5, 2010, (see <http://community.beck.de/gruppen/forum/multisensory-law/multisensory-law>), PETER EBENHOCH, a member of this community, questioned the concept of multisensory law. He also raised some further questions which call for a response.

I welcome the opportunity to respond to his posting. All passages would be worthy of comment. However, I am going to pick up some points that seem most important to the current state of multisensory law.

Although the term “multisensory law” needs clarification, multisensory law cannot be reduced to being a mere “concept,” as the author suggests. Drawing on insights of the theory of science and particularly on the sociology of science, I would posit that multisensory law constitutes a new legal discipline in the making (see BRUNSCHWIG, C. R., Multisensory Law and Legal Informatics – A Comparison of How these Legal Disciplines Relate to Visual Law, in: A. Geist et al. (eds.), Structuring Legal Semantics – with an Essay on Multisensory Law, Bern 2011, p. 573-667, also available online at <http://jusletter-it.weblaw.ch/login.php?ref_url_succ=http%3A%2F%2Fjusletter-it.weblaw.ch%3A80%2Farticle%2Fde%2F_324%3Flang%3Dde&ref_url_fail=http://jusletter-it.weblaw.ch/fail.php>; see also <http://blog.weblaw.ch/2011/02/17/editions-weblaw-new-publication/>). My posting leaves no room for putting forward the same arguments again.

The aforementioned essay also clarifies the term “multisensory law” (see BRUNSCHWIG, ibid., p. 581 sqq.). I would like to encourage both PETER EBENHOCH and the audience to debate whether my suggestions foster scientific and practical discourse or need to be reconsidered.

No one can deny that there is a need to determine the subject matter and cognitive interest of multisensory law. On the necessity to determine the subject matter of a legal discipline, see, for example, KAUFMANN (Kaufmann, A., Rechtsphilosophie, Rechtstheorie, Rechtsdogmatik, in: A. Kaufmann, W. Hassemer, and U. Neumann (eds.), Einführung in Rechtsphilosophie und Rechtstheorie der Gegenwart, 8th, revised ed., Heidelberg et al. 2011, p. 3). The above essay proposes how this could be done (see BRUNSCHWIG, ibid., p. 592 sqq.) The debate on this crucial question needs to be persued.

If I understand PETER EBENHOCH correctly, he tends to consider the postings of the community on multisensory law as intrasubjective monologues. Since these postings are addressed to a large audience, I have difficulties in following this notion. Whether the community responds to the postings or not, the postings can – at any time – come under close scrutiny.

PETER EBENHOCH has written a PhD thesis entitled “Visualisierung und Formalisierung regulierter Selbstregulierung im Wirtschaftsrecht” (Visualization and Formalization of Regulated Selfregulation in Business Law). To my knowledge, this PhD thesis is not publicly available. Despite PETER EBENHOCH’S strong commitment to visual law, he appears to adhere to the (still) prevailing verbocentric legal paradigm. In other words, he apparently claims that legal communication mainly amounts to verbal communication. Given the growing significance of visual and audiovisual communication in the legal context (see BRUNSCHWIG, ibid., p. 592 sqq. and 618 sqq.), it is questionable whether such a traditional position does full justice to the legal and legally relevant phenomena at stake.

PETER EBENHOCH calls on the community to restrict itself to visual law (in his words “Visualisierung des Rechts” (visualization of the law) or to multimedia law (in his words “Multimedialität des Rechts”). I have established that the legal and legally relevant sensory phenomena under consideration transcend the “mere” visual. For instance, visual law does not encompass the legal and legally relevant audiovisual phenomena (see BRUNSCHWIG, ibid., p. 613). Visual law therefore constitutes “only” a branch of multisensory law. PETER EBENHOCH also suggests that we should rather refer to multimedia law. As multisensory law also encompasses sensory phenomena that are not ICT-based (see BRUNSCHWIG, ibid., p. 643 sqq.), this term would be too narrow as well.

I look forward to receiving your comments.

(Please note: all websites in this posting were last accessed on March 31, 2011. Should you wish to have online access to the full text of my essay on multisensory law and legal informatics, do not hesitate to contact me.)

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