LEGAL DECISIONS AND LINGUISTIC THEORY

Richard Hare's universal prescriptivism

Abstract

This article aims to present Universal Prescriptivism in a systematic way and justify its application in legal discourse. It is a moral theory proposed by Richard Hare whose application allows the logical analysis of the arguments used by the courts from the perspectives of identity and non-contradiction, being an important analytical tool for the assessment of decisions in which general principles and clauses are used. It also allows us to investigate whether the requirement of coherence of meaning, employed in the concepts on which decisions are based, is observed. The deductive method was applied, using bibliographic references on the subject, to point out the importance of universal prescriptivism in judicial decision-making.