Page - 174 - in Critical Issues in Science, Technology and Society Studies - Conference Proceedings of the 17th STS Conference Graz 2018

As noted above, the legal sub-system is cognitively open but normatively closed. Thus, it is for the legal sub-system to impart meaning onto those messages that resonate with the binary coding lawful/unlawful. Crucially, the meaning of a message depends on the context of the message i.e. the set of possible messages from which it is selected. Since the context of a message cannot be communicated, or directly observed, the meaning of a message is always inferred by the (legal) observer. Inferences with regard to the meaning and context of forensic knowledge imparted by forensic reports are shaped through a reductive process, which constrains the set of possible contextual messages, from which the content of the report is selected, to a further binary: match/non-match. As King states, ‘The normative communications of other systems cannot simply be reproduced by law as legal communication. They first have to be reconstructed as law if they are to become accepted as law, and this reconstruction process may well give rise to unforeseen distortions and reductions to the meaning of the original communications as they were formulated in [other] systems.’1 Thus, certain forensic-scientific mechanisms (DNA/Bayes, and streamlined reporting) may provide the means for the reformulation and reconstruction of forensic discourse, at the point at which that discourse threatens to import a penumbra of ‘unhelpful’ meanings and contextual choices. Such a view is predicated on the existence of a differential power arrangement between competing sub-systems. Although autopoiesis does not address hierarchical or hegemonic issues as directly as other theoretical perspectives, it nevertheless takes account of inequalities of power, and domination of one sub-system by another. As King states, ‘the relationship between social meaning systems is not necessarily one of equality. Although it is theoretically possible for each social system to reconstruct every other system according to its own procedures and to attribute its own meaning to that system, those systems which are widely accepted as defining meanings for the whole of society are in a much more powerful position than others.’2 Such is the possible degree of refraction across discrete sub-systems that it is possible to speak of 'the enslavement' of the knowledge of one meaning system by another.’ This is particularly true of interactions involving economics, politics, science, and law and may account for the reformation of scientific discourses through procedural means, in particular the CAI and SFR processes. This need not imply that the scientific sub-system is prevented from asserting an alternative meaning to forensic information, since alternative contextual options are available: ‘It is always possible for the less prevalent systems to insist on their own self-constructions and indeed to reconstruct successful meaning systems according to their particular procedures and reality versions. The problem these weaker systems face, however, is to convince society, the world 1 King, M. The Truth About Autopoiesis (1993) Journal of Law and Society Vol. 20 No.2 at page 466 2 Ibid. at p.467 174