The role of the Rhetoric in the development of critical thinking of law

Abstract

Rhetoric has accompanied the science of Law since its birth. This art has contributed to the birth of the Philosophy of Law and Critical Thinking in Law. Rhetoric is intrinsically linked to criticism. It is an approach which consists of submitting every argument to judgment according to the method of antilogy. Rhetoric is, therefore, a pedagogy of criticism.

Thanks to Perelman’s work, the potentialities of rhetoric has been rediscovered by lawyers. That said, the modern Critical Legal Theories have underestimated the critical potential of rhetoric. We will try to explain in our article the origin of the fracture between the art of rhetoric and critical thinking and will illustrate how Perelman's New Rhetoric has recomposed this fracture.