On the Ontology and Metaphysics of Legal Norms

This work analyses the question of the ontology of legal norms, i.e., what kind of entities are legal norms and how these entities come into existence. Regarding the first question, the article rejects that legal norms are (i) abstract entities independent from other entities or (ii) concrete entities dependent on other entities. Instead, it is defended that legal norms are abstract entities and dependent on other entities. Regarding the second question, the article dismisses the idea that the dependency relation may be explained correctly (i) by the notion of causality or (ii) by the notion of supervenience. Instead, it is held that the dependency relation is correctly explained by a liberal notion of grounding.