A CRITICAL APPROACH IN COMPARATIVE LEGAL STUDIES: A Lesson for Islamic Legal Scholarship

Ahmad Rofii(1*),


(1) Fakultas Syariah dan EKonomi Islam IAIN Syekh Nurjati Cirebon
(*) Corresponding Author

Abstract


Kajian perbandingan hukum ortodoks percaya bahwa ada sains perbandingan hukum yang bersifat murni dan obyektif, yang dapat menjaga jarak dari konvensi dan historisitasnya. Melawan asumsi tersebut, tulisan ini berpendapat bahwa anggapan akan obyektifitas dalam kajian perbandingan hukum tidak dapat dipertahankan. Tulisan ini juga berupaya melihat masa depan kajian perbandingan hukum. Ia berpendapat bahwa adalah tidak kritis untuk mengatakan bahwa ada teks hukum yang dapat dipahami di luar konteksnya, karena setiap teks berada dalam situasi tertentu dan lekat dengan konteksnya. Pandangan positifistik terhadap hukum sudah usang. Tugas penelitian perbandingan bukanlah untuk mencari kebenaran-sebagai-ketepatan. Tetapi, ia berupaya untuk menyingkap dimensi laten dari hukum. Obsesi ortodoksi untuk melakukan uniformasi hukum menyembuyikan fakta akan perbedaan.

The orthodox comparative legal studies believe that there is a pure and objective science of comparative legal studies able to distance itself from “conventions” and its historicity. Against this assumption, this paper will argue that the objectivity claim in comparative legal studies is flawed. This paper also attempts to see what the future of comparative legal studies could be. It argues that it is uncritical to say that there is a legal text that can be understood out of its context, because every text is situated and embedded. The positivistic view of law was obsolete. The duty of comparative research is not to search for truth-as-correctness. Rather, it attempts to unconceal the latent dimension of law. The orthodoxy’s obsession to uniformization of law deceives the fact of difference.


Keywords


Comparative legal studies, the orthodoxy, understanding, sameness, alterity

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References


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DOI: 10.24235/mahkamah.v1i1.452

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