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Emmanuel Melissaris

Associate Professor in Law at the London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE)

Resident at the Forschungskolleg Humanwissenschaften:

May/June 2015

Research topic at the Forschungskolleg Humanwissenschaften:

»A Post-metaphysical Theory of Criminal Law«

Project outline:

The aim of my research is to construct a political philosophical theory of the criminal law and explore its implications for criminalisation, criminal responsibility and punishment. The project is rooted in the post-petaphysical turn in political and legal philosophy. The aim is to construct a theory of the criminal law, which does not rely on controversial moral doctrines and is suitable for a specific type of political society with a specific type of institutional structure. This has several upshots. First, the wrongfulness of some acts is to be judged with reference to the political duties, flowing from the terms of social cooperation and not in relation to an independent moral order. Secondly, the criminal law is grounded in its acceptability by all citizens. Thirdly, the political conception of the person also determines the subject of the criminal law. In Frankfurt I hope to explore the specific implications of these general theses and develop general principles of criminalisation and criminal responsibility. In particular, I will consider the following questions: Under which political duties are participants in a political community with these general characteristics? Who may respond to violations of these political duties? What kind of response is justified and on what terms? What are the constraints to criminalisation and punishment (in particular constraints stemming from the rule of law, democracy and social justice)? How can acts be attributed to an actor simpliciter and as criminal offences? (Emmanuel Melissaris)

Funding of the stay:

Excellence Cluster »The formation of normative orders«

Research partner:

Emmanuel Melissaris follows the invitation of Klaus Günther (Professor of Criminal Law at Frankfurt University and Co-speaker of the University's Cluster of Excellence »The formation of normative orders«).

Scholarly profile of Emmanuel Melissaris

Main areas of research:

Philosophy and Sociology of Law, Criminal Law

Selected publications:

»Thories of Crime and Punishment«, in: Markus D. Dubber und Tatjana Hörnle (eds), The Oxford Handbook of Criminal Law, Oxford Handbooks in Law, Oxford University Press, Oxford 2014.
»Property offences as crimes of injustice«, in: Criminal Law and Philosophy, vol. 6 (2) (2012), pp. 149-166.
(with J. E. Penner), McCoubrey & White's Textbook on Jurisprudence, Oxford University Press, Oxford 2012.
Ubiquitous Law: Legal Theory and the Space for Legal Pluralism, Ashgate, Farnham 2009.

Emmanuel Melissaris

Scholarly profile of Emmanuel Melissaris

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