Abstract

This article discusses the authority problem involved in revolutions and the institution of legal order from a phenomenological perspective. Paradoxically, every new claim to power, every revolutionary beginning, should present itself as coherent with what has already been established as authoritative by law. This authority problem is due to the two-fold challenge revolutions pose: the new order has to both constitute a break with the old order (transgression) and retain a relationship with it (response). In order to meet this two-fold challenge, I will draw on the work of Hannah Arendt and Maurice Merleau-Ponty and develop a concept of the institution of legal order that can embrace transgression and response as two sides of the same coin and can shed new light on the authority problem involved in revolutions.