Contenu du sommaire : Produire la loi.

Codification and Legal Postmodernism : The New Spanish Criminal Code of 1995. Theoretical reports on codification tend to consider codes as absolutely dependent on the existence of a liberal State and necessarily linked to Modernity. However, a new Criminal Code was stated in Spain in 1995. To what extent does the new Spanish Criminal Code preserve the traits of traditional codes ? Could an ancient legislative technique be used nowadays without seeming an anachronism ? We will try to draw up some possible answers analysing the different 'actors' that took part in the making of this new Criminal Code.

The Architects of the Law. Legal-Political Spaces During the Third Republic. If we consider the shape of the criminal field during the Third Republic, we observe quite a sophisticated architecture which is due to the creation of intermediary spaces such as the Conseil supérieur des prisons or the Société générale des prisons. As a laboratory for criminal law, the Société established itself as a kind of private and extra-parliamentary commission, permanently in session. Consideration of these spaces will enable us to reflect upon the socio-political ways of elaborating law, the networks of social reform or public action and the different development 'schemes' of the political aspect in the criminal domain.

Penal Epistemic Communities and the Making of Criminal Law Norms. Rediscovering the heuristic potential of Max Weber's patterns, researchers in the field of légal sociology present law as an operative fiction in the social regulation process. In many monographies on the penal field, the making of criminal law is depicted as a game between actors who want to achieve specific goals in the process. The concept of « penal epistemic communities » will help to evaluate the influence of knowledge on the building of penal strategies, and to weigh the action potential of social networks on the penal field, whose members try to orient the formal response to criminal problems.

Superposing Conflicts : Limitations of the Judiciary Process as a Mechanism for Conflict Resolution. In this text we would like to advance the Theory of institutions. We want to show how Law contributes to the shaping of social relations, in particular the judicialization of marital conflicts. This research shows how the trial process modifies the relations between the litigants by adding to the initial conflict a pre-set interaction process : litigation. An empirical demonstration using quantitative data complements our theoretical summary of the question. It shows that, generally, whereas severe conflicts tend to persist after the trial, spouses in a less severe state of conflict continue to negotiate agreements outside the legal process. In both cases, we pose the problem of the limitations of the court trial.

British Culture and European Culture : Landmarks of a Political and Legal Evolution. The entrance of Great Britain into the European Union has lead to a profound evolution of the political and legal culture, from the symbolic as well as from the institutional point of view. This evolution is based on two principles - identification of similarities between the European culture and the British culture and identification of a probable gain to be obtained from these changes - and can be viewed from different levels : political parties and trade unions modifying their ways of working and the création of internal divisions ; political groups and local authorities taking advantages of links with their counterparts in other European countries ; society and its hierarchy being questioned ; some aspects of legal reasoning becoming modified...

Citizenship and Legitimacy. Constitutional Patriotism as the Basis of National Identity. Habermas argues for a constitutional patriotism based on the universalistic principles which support the idea of a constitutional state, and against the particularistic sense of belonging to the nation as a concrete historical entity. As a matter of fact the notion of constitutional patriotism accounts for certain aspects of the construction of citizenship in Canada, particularly since the coming into effect of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. This notion nevertheless presents serious problems on the sociological level, when applied to the situation prevailing in Canada and Quebec. These problems stem from Habermas' s own theoretical perspective, which overlooks motivation as a force underlying the construction of nationhood, the agonistic nature of the political as exemplified by the Canadian constitutional debate and the existence of contradictory principles of legitimacy which cannot be reduced in an univocal way.