”Lain tarkoitus ja systematiikka huomioon ottaen on selvää” – julkilausutut systeemiperustelut korkeimman oikeuden ja korkeimman hallintooikeuden ratkaisuissa
Avainsanat:
oikeusteoria, systeeminen tulkinta, korkein oikeus, korkein hallinto-oikeus, tutkimusmenetelmätAbstrakti
“Considering the purpose and systematics of the law it is evident…” – Expressed systemic arguments in the decisions of the Supreme Court and the Supreme Administrative Court of Finland
The purpose of the article is to analyse the use of expressed systemic arguments in the decisions of the Supreme Court and the Supreme Administrative Court of Finland. The authors discuss the theme from three main perspectives. First, they provide a theoretical analysis of the different types of systemic argument. Second, they analyse the decisions of the courts qualitatively to provide practical examples of the use of the different types of systemic argument. Third, they analyse the decisions of the courts quantitatively to examine whether there have been significant changes in the frequency and manner of use of openly expressed systemic arguments during the past decades. They show that the use of such arguments has indeed increased during the 21st Century.
The main result of the analyses is that there is something of discrepancy between the theoretical assumptions and the related qualitative results on one hand and the quantitative results on the other. Ideally, the courts ought to openly express the use of systemic arguments in their decisions. The authors note, however, that the recognition of systemic arguments usually requires a careful between-the-lines reading of the decisions. Their quantitative analysis further indicates that the expressed systemic arguments in the decisions are often not formulated by the courts themselves. The authors argue that the systemic arguments used by the courts are in fact openly expressed most often when the courts are citing sources of law. In the Supreme Administrative Court, expressed systemic arguments are often used when quoting the decisions of the European Court of Justice and in the Supreme Court when citing draft legislation. Moreover, the authors note that draft legislation seems to have adopted systems terminology, used in the language for the expression of systemic arguments, from the legislation of the European Union. The authors conclude that the noticeable increase in the use of expressed systemic arguments in the Supreme Court and the Supreme Administrative Court of Finland is closely linked to the direct and indirect influence of European legislation.
