Meta-ethics to meta-jurisprudence: An expressivist trace in legal philosophy

In this study, the interaction between modern moral and legal philosophy is analyzed in the context of the thoughts of H.L.A. Hart, one of the most important representatives of legal positivism. The relationship between moral and legal philosophy is mostly discussed in the context of utilitarianism and classical legal positivism. Our study aims to reveal the theoretical influence on modern analytical legal positivism, which is sourced from moral philosophy, by focusing on a more recent period. Accordingly, the views of Kevin Toh, who attributes "meta-ethical expressivism" to Hart, have been chosen as the starting point for the inquiry. Disagreements about Hart's expressivism arise around the debate on meta-ethical cognitivism and non-cognitivism. On the other hand, some philosophers draw similarities between Hart's views and Simon Blackburn's "quasi-realist" and Allan Gibbard's "norm-expressivist" theories. Through these theories, expressivism today evolves into a hybrid position between cognitivism and non-cognitivism. Considering that there were early versions of these expressivist approaches in Hart's time, we believe that Hart can be considered a "proto quasi-expressivist" within the framework of the views of the philosophers examined. Expressivism, which emerged through the concept of "internal point of view" in Hart's theory, is one of the points of interaction between modern moral and legal philosophy. Considering the criticism that legal philosophy debates are limited to discussions of law and morality at the "normative level", revealing the interaction between moral and legal philosophy paves the way for the emergence of new and original approaches such as "meta-legal expressivism". Thus, Hart's legal theory, as an "expressivist trace in legal philosophy", plays a leading role in transferring different approaches from "meta-ethics to meta-jurisprudence".