Epistemic-Justificatory Proof Theory and the Legitimacy of Judicial Decisions

A judge’s decision plays a central role in the rule of law by establishing legal truth and legitimizing the state’s coercive power. This role has become increasingly complex in contemporary adjudication, where courts confront scientific, statistical, and algorithmic evidence amid normative uncertainty and heightened human rights demands. This article examines legal interpretation and proof in judicial decisions as a process of epistemic justification rather than procedural compliance. Using a qualitative normative approach supported by conceptual–philosophical and limited comparative analysis, the study explores how judges construct claims of legal truth through evidentiary reasoning. A review of the literature shows that existing studies on proof remain fragmented—doctrinal, probabilistic, or technological—and lack an integrated epistemological framework capable of explaining the inferential transition from evidence to legal fact. This fragmentation risks reducing judicial legitimacy to formal compliance or subjective judicial belief. The article’s primary contribution is the proposal of Epistemic-Justificatory Proof Theory, which defines proof as an epistemic practice that necessitates inferential transparency, rational coherence, and intersubjective testability. By integrating legal theory with the philosophy of science, this framework offers an evaluative model for assessing the legitimacy of judicial decisions and provides a normative response to the challenges of proof in contemporary justice systems.