Searching for Arguments: Applying a Knowledge-based Ontology of the Legal Domain

摘要

Legal ontologies are conceptual models of specific parts of the legal domain. They provide stable foundations for domain representation, essential to building legal information systems. The ontology presented in this article provides an analysis of the concept of knowledge in the legal domain. It is shown how new functions for information technology applications in the legal domain can be developed on the basis of this analysis. In particular, a search function distinguishing between the content and structure of legal arguments is described in order to show how the analysis is put into practice.