Abstract

In Western societies the relation between institutions and norms presents itself like an explicitly instituted relation which is ruled by verifiable public procedures. The anthropological analysis allows a full consideration of this juridical experience. It focuses on some of its specific characteristics which identify it and contextualize it, removing thus any pretension of absoluteness to the Western experience. In such a way, the specific Greek-Western contribution to the constitution of “juridical civilization” comes out clearly. It has been identified in the active and therefore tendentially autonomous relation between collectivity and the social structure. The “game” in question is therefore extremely serious and complex and, in it, the symbolic dimension and the normative instance intertwine to give rise to the actual identity of the social subjects.