Legal Systems and Complexity: A Comment on Allen

This work addresses Ronald J. Allen's views on complexity, evidence, and law. After some remarks on normative systems and the metaphors used to characterize them, the work addresses the issue of complexity by asking how a system characterized by complexity can tame the world's complexity; the focus then shifts to some aspects of evidence and evidential reasoning under that characterization of the legal system; and in conclusion the work points out the main questions posed with respect to Allen's account. Reference is made to the Kelsenian and Hartian accounts of normative and legal systems, asking in what respects Allen's account marks a theoretical advance on prior literature and suggesting that a major aspect lies in the account's focus on the adaptive nature of the legal system.