The concept of law as an autopoietic system is current in contemporary legal theory. It is based on a substantial change in defining law from traditional definitions of law as a normative system to law as a social subsystem. There are no grounds for this redefinition of law and it produces no added value. The theory of law as an autopoietic system is despite its manifest weakness an important inspiration for legal theory, particularly for the research of relations between law and its environment. One reason to reconsider this concept is the idea of circularity in legal systems.
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