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Law in-between Eros and Thanatos -Psychoanalytic Understanding of Law-

This article attempts to understand law through Freudian psychoanalytic perspective. It especially focuses on a thesis “law in-between eros and thanatos”, which is one of the key propositions suggested by the interdisciplinary study of law and Freudian psychoanalysis. As the point of balance inbetween eros and thanatos is a spot of dynamic power struggle, and as eros and thanatos interact in such a complex manner, the law which aims at reaching the balance between the two forces becomes indeterminable. But the law which is indeterminable, which struggles inbetween eros and thanatos, inbetween life and death is the very law which is expected to flourish in the coming future. However, the law which tries hard to achieve the balance between eros and thanatos cannot be an immortal authority, which it used to be, any more. The law also becomes something that circulates inbetween life and death. The most important attitude required for the law which is facing these tasks is the openness to communication with unconsciousness. Only if the law pays attention and listens to the message of unconscious instincts which were oppressed under the paradigm of modern rational law, it will be able to succeed in the task. To make the communication mutual and balanced, the law should open its mind to the emergence of new justice which conflicts with the traditional justice that it used to purse. What the interdisciplinary study of law and Freudian psychoanalysis would ask for might seem dangerous and norm-destructive in the perspective of law. But to move onto a more balanced and communicative future, law need to admit that there might be a seed of new legality in what is currently evaluated as illegal.