Legal Hermeneutics as Ideology: from the Computer-Judge to Class Struggle, from the Adulteration of Consciousness to Interpellation as Legal Subject

Abstract

In response to the article “A ideologia como determinante da hermenêutica jurídica” [Ideology as a determinant of Legal Hermeneutics] by Lima, Queiroz, and Carmo, this paper presents – grounded in Althusser and opposing an epistemological definition of ideology as false representation – a conception of ideology as a social practice centred on interpellation as subject. To counter the definition of legal hermeneutics as normative co-creation, the text employs Pashukanis’ critique of law, evidencing the centrality of legal subjectivity. Thus, it is concluded that ideology is not merely integrated into legal hermeneutics; rather, legal hermeneutics is a social practice embedded within and reproductive of legal ideology. Contrary to expectations of reducing judicial decision-making to mere technique (the extreme of which is the “computer-judge” utopia) or to a well-intentioned pursuit of justice (even social justice), this study argues for situating it within the political sphere, and therefore as a terrain offering narrow margins for the proletarian class struggle.