Societal Constitutionalism: From Context to Theory

Document Type : Original Article

Authors

1 Associate Professor of Public Law, Faculty of Law, Shahid Beheshti University, Tehran, Iran.

2 Assistant Professor of Public Law, Faculty of Law, Shahid Beheshti University, Tehran, Iran.

3 PhD in Public Law, Faculty of Law, Shahid Beheshti University, Tehran, Iran.

10.22091/cpl.2026.14912.1088

Abstract

The emergence of the theory of societal constitutionalism may be understood as a response to the concern for according legitimacy to diverse forms of social rationality. Evidently, the necessity of envisaging an order independent of politics for the sphere of the economy, which was articulated in the early twentieth century through the idea of a fiscal constitution, played a significant role in the acceptance of the distinctive logic of social systems. Likewise, the foundations and doctrines of legal pluralism effectively paved the way for the expansion of the scope of constitutionalism. Ultimately, these intellectual endeavors found reflection in the Niklas Luhmann’s Systems Theory and were further developed, from the perspective of David Sciulli, through the procedural understanding of law advanced by Jürgen Habermas and Lon L. Fuller. According to Luhmann, rather than concentrating on the distinction between the state and society, society ought to be conceived as consisting of various social systems, such as the economy, politics, education, and law, each of which, despite possessing an autopoietic and self-regulating character, is inevitably required to establish a structural coupling with its surrounding environment. In this respect, the threat posed by the encroachment of systems on one another’s shperes necessitates the anticipation of self-limitation mechanisms, while simultaneously maintaining equilibrium with the surrounding. In this manner, constitutionalism, which had long been designated solely to confront state power, continues to exist faithfuly to the various dimensions of collective life. The final finding of this study, developed in light of its pedagogy-oriented methodology and sociological analysis, is that the key to overcoming the deficiencies of traditional constitutional theories in confronting contemporary manifestations of power lies not in the formulation of a global constitutional order, but rather, conversely, in the recognition of the plurality of social systems and the particular rationality inherent in each of them

Keywords

Main Subjects

References

استوارسنگری، کورش (1403). «لزوم مفهوم‌شناسی حقوقی حوزه عمومی با نقد دیدگاه‌های غیرحقوقی با تأکید بر نقد دیدگاه هابرماس». حقوق عمومی تطبیقی، دوره ۱، شماره۳.  
رحمت‌اللهی، حسین و یزدی‌زاده البرز، فاطمه (2019). «اخلاقیات درونی قانون در اندیشه لون فولر». فصلنامه تحقیقات حقوقی، دوره ۲۲، شماره۸۶.  
مهدوی، سید محمدصادق و باقری، دانیال (2019). «تحلیل و نقد نظریه سیستم‌های نیکلاس لومان». پژوهشنامه انتقادی متون و برنامه‌های علوم انسانی، دوره ۱۹، شماره۱۰.  
 
References
In English
Baraldi, C., Corsi, G., & Esposito, E. (2021). Unlocking Luhmann: A keyword introduction to systems theory (K. Walker, Trans.). Bielefeld University Press.
Derrida, J. (1992). The other heading: Reflections on today’s Europe (P.-A. Brault & M. B. Naas, Trans.). Indiana University Press.
Gierke, O. von. (1933). Natural law and the theory of society: 1500 to 1800. Cambridge University Press.
Gierke, O. von. (1977). Associations and law: The classical and early Christian stages (G. Heiman, Ed. & Trans.). University of Toronto Press.
Gurvitch, G. (1947). The sociology of law. Kegan Paul, Trench, Trübner & Co.
Hart, H. L. A., & Green, L. (2012). The concept of law (J. Raz & P. A. Bulloch, Eds.). Oxford University Press.
Loughlin, M. (2010). What is constitutionalisation? In P. Dobner & M. Loughlin (Eds.), The twilight of constitutionalism? (pp. 59-63). Oxford University Press.
Luhmann, N. (1985). A sociological theory of law (M. Albrow, Ed.; E. King-Utz, Trans.). Routledge & Kegan Paul.
Luhmann, N. (1992). The coding of the legal system. In G. Teubner & A. Febbrajo (Eds.), State, law, and economy as autopoietic systems: Regulation and autonomy in a new perspective (pp. 145-185). Giuffrè.
Luhmann, N. (2004). Law as a social system (K. A. Ziegert, Trans.). Oxford University Press.
Nonet, P., Selznick, P., & Kagan, R. A. (2017). Law and society in transition: Toward responsive law. Routledge.
Romano, S. (2017). The legal order. Routledge.
Sciulli, D. (1988). Foundations of societal constitutionalism: Principles from the concepts of communicative action and procedural legality. British Journal of Sociology, 39, 377-408.
Sciulli, D. (1992). Theory of societal constitutionalism: Foundations of a non-Marxist critical theory. Cambridge University Press.
Teubner, G. (1983). Substantive and reflexive elements in modern law. Law & Society Review, 17(2), 239-285.
Teubner, G. (1993). Law as an autopoietic system (Z. Bankowski, Ed.). Blackwell.
Teubner, G. (1997). Breaking frames: The global interplay of legal and social systems. The American Journal of Comparative Law, 45(1), 149-169.
Teubner, G. (2001). Hybrid laws: Constitutionalizing private governance networks. In R. A. Kagan, M. Krygier, & K. Winston (Eds.), Legality and community: On the intellectual legacy of Philip Selznick (pp. 331-334). Rowman & Littlefield.
Teubner, G. (2012). Constitutional fragments: Societal constitutionalism and globalization. Oxford University Press.
Teubner, G., & Ladeur, K.-H. (2004). Global private regimes: Neo-spontaneous law and dual constitution of autonomous sectors? In Public governance in the age of globalization (pp. 71-87). Routledge.
In Persian
Mahdavī, S. M. Ṣ., & Bāqerī, D. (2019). Analysis and critique of Niklas Luhmann’s systems theory. Critical Studies in Humanities Texts and Programs, 19(10).
Ostovār-Sangarī, K. (2024). The necessity of a legal conceptualization of the public sphere through a critique of non-legal approaches, with emphasis on a critique of Habermas’s perspective. Comparative Public Law, 1(3).
Raḥmatollāhī, Ḥ., & Yazdīzādeh Alborz, F. (2019). The internal morality of law in Lon Fuller’s thought. Legal Research Quarterly, 22(86).
Journal of Comparative Public Law
Volume 2, Issue 4 - Serial Number 8
December 2025
Pages 30-55

Files

Share

How to cite

Statistics