A Study On The Legitimacy Of Courtroom Mediation Discourse

The study of courtroom discourse should occupy an important position in legal study. An acquisition of the legitimacy of courtroom mediation system need investigate the judges’use of language in the whole mediating process. Judges as actors of the mediating process, according to the Habermas’s relevant theory, obtain their legitimacy through an objective truth, a subjective truthfulness, and a normative rightness of their language use. The three basic principles of courtroom mediation system and validity claims under the arrival of consensus are continuums of discourse in mediation legislation.The paper consists of six chapters, foreword and conclusion part. The Foreword part demonstrates that the tense between fact and legitimacy in judicial process needs a deep investigation of the legitimacy of judges’action, especially their discourse action in the mediating process.Chapter 1 concerns the courtroom mediation discourse and its legitimacy, mainly introducing reasons to the choice of this theme, its status quo, content and methodology, followed with one conclusive comment. The various advantages of courtroom mediation and nowadays the construction of a harmonious society make the necessity of focusing on courtroom mediation system, and the close relationship between law and language and its status quo reflect the important and urgent need of a study on courtroom mediation discourse. Judges’language use and its legitimacy in the mediating process decide the legitimacy of the whole courtroom mediation system.Chapter 2 focuses on the study of the objective truth of judges’mediation discourse, introduces the relevant theory, analyzes the different strategies used in mediation, such as concept clarification, presupposition clarification, fact recognition, vague and matter-of-fact strategies, and investigates judges’attitudes and standpoints through giving examples. Data shows that judges use different strategies to help parties arrive at the agreement, but it should meet the truth of their speech acts, while not replace the party’s opinions with their own judgment on the case fact itself.Chapter 3 focuses on the study of the subjective truthfulness of judges’mediation discourse, introduces the relevant theory, analyzes the different strategies used in mediation, such as attitude strategy, sympathy strategy, service strategy, politeness strategy, face strategy and irrelevant story-telling strategy, and investigates judges’truthfulness through the approaches of back-to-back mediation, theme control and transference. Data shows that judges have intention to express their sincere attitudes to parties with contradictive results, and on the back of truthfulness, politeness and warm-heartedness secures the judges’objective, neutral attitude and standpoint.Chapter 4 focuses on the study of the normative rightness of judges’mediation discourse, introduces the relevant theory, analyzes the different schemata used in mediation, and investigates the normative construction of courtroom mediation processes, the probability of wrong mediating, and the role-play of being a mediator or a judge. The reality that judges often‘beat around the bush’tells us that the phenomena like‘a judge is a judge’,‘the judge has the final say’occur frequently, which loses the legitimacy of courtroom mediation.Chapter 5 investigates the union between validity claims and courtroom mediation legislation, which shows language as the medium of communication, making courtroom mediation legislation the continuum of consensus arrival and three basis principles of mediation system. To acquire the legitimacy of courtroom mediation discourse is to help parties concerned arrive at the consensus, to use language under the mediation system, and to secure the realization of human rights on the base of discursive consensus theory.Chapter 6 provides the possible reasons and advices in courtroom mediation legislation from the perspective of language use. The three principles in mediation bases itself on the whole process of judges’mediation, and this mediating process bases itself on the judges’speech acts, so there is a necessity to respect and apply the three principles extensively, and to legislate judges’speech acts.The Conclusion part summarizes the core content of the paper, that is, judges as the subjects of courtroom mediating action, by using the objective truth, the subjective truthfulness and the normative rightness of language, help parties arrive at a mediating agreement on the basis of the three principles of courtroom mediation system, acquire the legitimacy of courtroom mediation discourse, and provide the practical basis of courtroom mediation legislation.