Theme

Legal argumentation is a distinctively multidisciplinary field of inquiry. It draws its data, assumptions and methods from disciplines such as legal theory, legal philosophy, logic, argumentation theory, rhetoric, linguistics, literary theory, philosophy, sociology, etc. and its purpose is to reach conclusions through logical reasoning. It therefore includes the arts and sciences of civil debate, dialogue, conversation, and persuasion. It also studies rules of inference, logic, and procedural rules in both artificial and real world settings.

Various approaches can be considered: a historical and philosophical approach of legal argumentation ; a more theoretical approach of the various legal influences and theories that have shapen the study of legal argumentation but also a more practical approach : how arguments – legal and non legal –are prepared to be presented in court and how the validity of legal reasoning and legal argumentation is examined by the judges, but also by appeal courts, doctrine and by the public.

Submission and deadlines

We invite graduate students and faculty members wishing to participate to submit an abstract with at most 500 words indicating the title of the paper, name(s) and affiliation(s) of the author(s) to Juliette Sénéchal (juliette.senechal-2@univ-lille2.fr) and Xavier Fressoz (xavier.fressoz@univ-lille2.fr). We kindly ask you to attach a brief description of yourself (upto 200 words), which will be included in the conference materials. The deadline for abstracts is 15 May 2013. Confirmation of acceptance of the abstract and participation in the conference will be sent out on or around 1 June 2013.

The deadline for the working paper itself is the 1 September 2013. No limit on length or subject are imposed upon papers. Working papers are to be considered not yet definitive articles, but having an academic line of reasoning that is already structured and developed in such a way that the author feels comfortable defending it for a small audience of interested peers. Authors presenting working papers actively seek to acquire general and specific comments in order to improve their work.

As this conference is intended for graduate students and faculty members of the faculties involved and aimed at stimulating international oriented legal research, the organizers anticipate to accept all working papers from members of the associated faculties. Further details, including the working papers, the program of the conference, venue and travel details will be made available to participants on the website.

For questions and queries either contact your local faculty representative in the organizing committee or contact Juliette Sénéchal (juliette.senechal-2@univ-lille2.fr).