Twilight Imperium wrote:Arkolon wrote:So now we will have to go through the trouble of defining what is a legal institution, and what does being a legal institution entail. A legal institution is not a state. It is, put vaguely, an institution capable of defining or exercising law and justice, but that doesn't really help us. What does it take for someone, or something, to be a legal institution? If we are to include Weberian statelessness, ie the state of nature (which we ought to), then it would make absolutely no sense for only states to be considered legal institutions (because, eg polycentric law). A state enforces legal practices or legal institutions. I mean, from what I can conclude here, every single individual capable of signing a contract (either verbally or textually) is a legal institution, because they can set the legal parameters between parties in a contract, and the enforcement of these contracts are, in a state of nature, wholly up to them.
Thus, we can define a legal institution as any single individual, which makes ownership, property, and their enforcements and definitions thereof, up to them.
A legal institution is an institution that can make you follow its laws. One person could declare bananas illegal, and no one would care. If the United States declares bananas illegal within its borders, then anyone caught with bananas would be shot on sight. (or fined, whatever). If the United States declares bananas illegal anywhere, but the UK declares "bullshit, we love bananas", they'll fight a war and whoever wins gets to make laws for the other guys.
It's simplified, but that's generally how it works.
I'm afraid that that is wrong. What you are defining is a state-- an institution that has the monopoly on the enforcement of all contracts in a given geographical area. A state enforces the law, and in most or nearly-all cases the state has a judiciary branch (a legal institution), but not all legal institutions are states. Look at it this way: one person could declare bananas illegal on their territory (in a stateless world, say), and anyone entering their property would be shot on sight (or fined, whatever).