LEGAL COMMUNICATION AND THE IDEA OF PLAIN LANGUAGE: PASSIBILITIES AND LIMITATION

Abstract

In today’s times, there is increasing attention paid to the recipients of legal texts and legal documents which can be very complex and incomprehensible to laypeople. However, these texts must be correctly understood by them, as these individuals are also subject to the law. It is debated whether it is worth simplifying texts from the law field, what the consequences of doing that are, and if it is worth doing, then by what methods would allow for achieving the most efficient and satisfactory results. Researchers recognize numerous possibilities and limitations arising from the concept of plain legal language, in the spirit of which legal texts are simplified. The purpose of this paper is to examine the solutions proposed by researchers in the field of simplifying legal and juridical texts, to identify the most satisfactory ones among them, and to share observations on why it is necessary, and even essential, to allocate increasing space in legal-linguistic discussions to the concept of plain language. It is also suggested that European countries can serve as an example in the process of striving towards increasingly effective measures aimed at simplifying legal and juridical texts

Keywords

• simple language
• law simplification
• linguistics
• legal communication
• law
• plain legal language.