No legal text exists in a state of inertia. The purpose of every law, be it in the form of an act or a treaty, is to regulate certain relations among individuals, or states, or among individuals and states. The application, consequently, of a legal normative provision becomes inevitable, bringing along with it the necessity of interpretation by competent administrative or judicial organs^\
Interpretation, or construction^, viz. the attempt to make a text or a concept clear, to elucidate them in a contemporary factual context, and its role in the development of law have always been of great importance to legal theory and practice. The importance and difficulty of the interpretational process lie first and foremost in the nature of the words as linguistic tools of communication. The non-existence of a clear-cut, one and only, ‘meaning of a word', given that words/concepts exist always in a given, e.g. scientific or legal, context, has been the first step of man's mind towards the recognition and acknowledgment of the fact that a word may
^See Salmon, J.J.A., ‘Le fait dans l'application du droit international', 175 (II) Recueil des Cours (1982) 257, at 343.
^See Walker, D.M., The Oxford Companion to Law, Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1980, at 644.
acquire various meanings, depending on who provides the meaning, and for which purpose*^. Secondly, words provided in a legal context, in general, are subject to application/ interpretation under circumstances provided by a specific case before a specific interpreting organ. As stressed by C.P. Curtis, words in such cases are 'simply delegations to others of authority to give them meaning by applying them to particular things or occasions'®®.
Consequently, what a legal interpretation is able to engender may never be the meaning of a word, or a group of words, but
®’See Locke, J ., An Essay Concerning Human Understanding, Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1975, at 408, para. 8: Words by long and familiar use...come to excite in Men certain Ideas, so constantly and readily, that they are apt to suppose a natural connexion between them. But that they signify only Men's peculiar Ideas, and that by a perfectly arbitrary Imposition, is evident, in that they often fail to excite in others (even that use the same language) the same Ideas, we take them to be the Sign of: And every Man has so inviolable a Liberty, to make Words stand for what Ideas he pleases...'; see also Taylor, Ch., Philosophy and the Human Sciences, Cambridge etc., Cambridge University Press, 1985, at 22: 'Things only have meaning in a field, that is, in relation to the meanings of other things. This means that there is no such thing as a single, unrelated meaningful element...'. See also Williams, G.L., Language and the law', 61 Law Quarterly Review (1945) 71, at 384 et seg., Curtis, C.P., A better theory of legal interpretation', 3 Vanderbilt Law Review (1950) 407, at 409- 410, Frankfurter, P., 'Some reflections on the reading of statutes', 47 Columbia Law Review (1947) 527, at 529, Hilf, M . , Die Auslegung Mehrsprachigen Vertrâge, Berlin etc., Springer-Verlag, 1973, at 21, Weis, J.L., 'Jurisprudence by Webster's: The role of the dictionary in legal thought', 39 Mercer Law Review (1988) 961, at 973. See also Koskenniemi, M . , From Apology to Utopia, The Structure of International Legal Argument, Helsinki, Lakimiesliiton Kustannus, 1989, at 471-6.
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only their boundary^. It is exactly this boundary that limits interpreters of a legal instrument, thus prescribing the vital space* within which they may act and produce legal effects and new legal frameworks^. However, this space of action may, concurrently, play a liberal, progressive role allowing for the existence of a creative relationship (‘demiurgische Beziehung')” between legal text and interpreter. It is exactly that inherent potential multiplicity of readings of the legal language^ that may allow the individual interpreter to undertake a dynamic role in the course of the legal interpretation process, and to respond promptly and constructively to new needs or demands in
^^Ibid. at 426; see also Dworkin, R . , Law's Empire, London, Fontana Press, 1986, at 50-51, Kelsen, H . , Pure Theory of Law, Translation: M. Knight, Berkeley etc.. University of California Press, 1970, at 351.
’“See Twining, W . , Miers, D ., How to Do Things with Rules, London, Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1991, at 173-4, Kalinowski, G . , Philosophie et logique de l'interprétation en droit', 17 Archives de Philosophie du Droit (1972) 39, at 41, Sur, S., L'Interprétation en Droit International Public, Paris, LGDJ, 1974, at 85.
^See Frosini, V., ‘Die Auslegung der Menschenrechte', 79 Archiv für Rechts- und Sozialphilosophie (1993) 299, at 303. see also Bentham, J., (The Collected Works of), (edited by H.L.A. Hart), Of Laws in General, University of London, The Athlone Press, 1970, at 163. Perelman, Ch., L'interprétation juridique', 17 Archives de Philosophie du Droit (1972) 29, at 31.
’^See White, J.B., When Words Lose their Meaning, Chicago, London, The University of Chicago Press, 1984, at 273. See also Holmes, O.W., The theory of legal interpretation', 12 Harvard Law Review (1898-99), 417, Silving, H . , A plea for a law of interpretation', 98 University of Pennsylvania Law Review (1949-50) 499, at 501. See also Mouton, J.-D., Etude de la Méthode d'interprétation dite de l'Effet Utile en Droit International Public, Thèse, Doctorat d'Etat, Université de Nancy 11, 1986-1987, at 62-63, Siorat, L., Le Problème des Lacunes en Droit International, Paris, LGDJ, 1958, at 64.
factual problematic contexts.
2.3. METHODS OF INTERPRETATION IN THE CONTEXT OF TREATY TEXTS