Conceptual tools for legislators. Part I: Rules and norms

this paper aims to contribute to the precision of legislative language. Through the analysis of a number of central legal concepts and a discussion of the mutual relations between these concepts, it aims to provide legislators with conceptual tools that facilitate precise legislative drafting. The present paper is the first of a projected series of four papers and deals with rules and in particular with a subset of them, norms. The other three projected papers are to deal with legal positions, including rights, with juridical acts such as contracts, legislation and administrative dispositions, and with the ‘logic’ of rules, such as rule conflicts, the relation between rules, principles, rights, and values, exceptions to rules, and analogous rule application. The present paper starts with a foundational section that discusses the relation between language and reality. As a follow-up, the nature of rules is addressed, and a distinction is made between three main categories of rules. Then the focus moves to norms as a subcategory of rules. In this connection much attention is devoted to the so-called deontic facts, which are brought about by norms. Finally, the findings are summarised and related to the topics of the other three projected papers on conceptual tools for legislators.