Autopoiesis in Law and Society: A Rejoinder to Blankenburg

In this rejoinder, I try to clarify and to develop further the concept of “reflexive law” by expanding its theoretical framework. I make use of the theory of autopoietic systems—a recently developed version of system theory. Legal autonomy and social autonomy turn out to be the crucial concepts. Their reformulation in terms of closed, self-referential, and self-reproductive structures leads to the core problem for a post-interventionist law: Can the law adapt its internal models of social reality to the autopoietic organization of legally regulated social systems?