Law as an Object and the Concept of Law as a Subject Matter: A Methodological Distinction and Its Implications for Legal Scholarship

The article examines the methodological distinction between law as an object of scientific inquiry and the concept of law as the subject matter of theoretical analysis within general jurisprudence. It substantiates the primacy of selecting the object of research over constructing a conceptual framework and demonstrates how the initial delineation of the object affects the boundaries of legal scholarship and the comparability of doctrinal findings. The study analyses the consequences of an uncoordinated choice of the object of research, manifested in persistent pluralism of legal understandings and in difficulties in developing common criteria for legal reasoning and legal qualification. Particular attention is given to legal certainty and the reproducibility of scholarly procedures in developing theoretical constructs, as well as to the continuing relevance of the problem in the context of increasingly complex regulation and emerging forms of social interaction.