This interdisciplinary collection with contributions in English and French explores how the various disciplines of law and linguistics appreciate and work towards improving the nature of clarity and obscurity in legal language. For the first time, it brings together legal academics and practitioners, jurilinguists and linguists from the common law and civil law with the specific aim to understand the complex nature, practice and tools of clarity and obscurity in legal drafting. Topics addressed include how the Clarity framework has been put into practice through the use of plainer language, better comprehensibility, readability and access to legal or administrative texts. In an attempt to reflect the more recent development of the Clarity-Obscurity debate, the editors have also focused on the use of specific instruments to respond to the problems raised by obscurity to improve clarity.

Contents:

Sophie Cacciaguidi-Fahy/Anne Wagner: Searching for Clarity Véronique Champeil-Desplat : Les clairs-obscurs de la clarté juridique Ross Charnock: Clear Ambiguity – Richard Tremblay : L'abstraction au service de la clarté en rédaction législative Lucia Morra/Piercarlo Rossi/Carla Bazzanella: Metaphor in Legal Language: Clarity or Obscurity? Samuel Xavier : La contribution du Conseil constitutionnel à la transparence du discours juridique Catherine Bergeal : La qualité de la réglementation en France : question politique ou juridique Christopher Williams: Fuzziness in Legal English: What Shall we Do with Shall? Rose-Marie Gerbe : Le présent de l'indicatif dans le discours juridique français Lena Blomquist: One Little Word... Ros MacDonald: Writing Better Decisions: Plain English in Decision Writing Nicola Langton: Cleaning up the Act: Using Plain English in Legislation Arnaud Suspene : Clarification et simplification du langage administratif en France L'expérience du COSLA : Un Aspect de la Réforme de l'Etat Girolamo Tessuto: Simplifying Italian Administrative Language: An Overview Claude Coulombe/Benoît Robichaud : Adaptation d'un outil de langue simplifiée (Simplus) aux textes juridiques Nathan McDonald: Mustor ManagementTM: Exploring the Role of Graphical Tools in Achieving Greater Clarity in Instruction Francis Delpérée : Comme aurait dit Boileau.