Does the legal system in Dostoyevsky’s The Brothers Karamazov dispense justice or is it an ideological device?

Law in The Brothers Karamazov: Institution of Justice or Theater of Ideology?

Fyodor Mikhailovich Dostoyevsky’s The Brothers Karamazov is a philosophical novel in which not only individual conflicts but also the mechanisms of social structure, authority and ideology are deeply questioned. In this context, although the legal system in the novel is presented as an institution that functions to establish justice, it actually functions as a representative, even carrier, device of the dominant ideologies of the period. In other words, throughout the novel, law does not only judge crime; it also reproduces the value system of the order, confirms the epistemology of power and legitimizes social norms.

Law, Power and Representation: A Foucauldian Perspective

Michel Foucault’s concepts of “regimes of truth” and “disciplinary societies” are extremely functional in terms of analyzing the practice of law in The Brothers Karamazov. The trial of Dimitri Karamazov is not only a process in which the criminal responsibility of an individual is discussed, but also an attempt by the system to exonerate itself through his personality, social class, distance from the belief system and his “moral character”. This situation confirms Foucault’s claim that modern law is a disciplinary practice of power that monitors compliance not only with the law but also with behaviors deemed “normal”.

The representation of Dimitri in court constructs him not only as a potential murderer, but also as an individual who disrupts order, who cannot control his impulses, who has “deviated from God and reason”. In this representation, what is at stake is not justice, but moral normativity, the reestablishment of the dominant ideology and the continuity of power.

Althusserian Perspective: Law as a State Apparatus

Louis Althusser’s conceptualization of “ideological state apparatuses” (IDA) provides an important analysis of the novel’s depiction of law in this context. According to Althusser, the legal system, just like education, religion or the media, is one of the structures that serve to reproduce the ideology of the ruling class. In The Brothers Karamazov, the court is a platform where not only individual crimes but also family structure, morality and religion are questioned. In other words, the court is not an objective area of ​​judgment, but a “ritual area” where ideology is staged.

Indeed, in the case where Dmitri is tried, it is seen that the narrative that society wants to believe, not the defense, is more dominant. Evidence, witnesses and statements shape which “perpetrator” the social order wants to see, rather than revealing an objective reality. In this context, the court is aimed at satisfying the conscience of society, not the individual — which clearly reveals the ideological nature of the legal system.

The Absoluteness of Law in the Absence of God

Ivan Karamazov’s famous words — “If there is no God, everything is permissible” — also contain a deep criticism of the legal system. Here, Dostoyevsky implies that the absence of God has dragged man into absolute nihilism, and that the state and its legal system have replaced God and become absolute authority. The metaphysical authority that has been emptied with the loss of God has now been taken over by worldly authority, namely the state.

In this context, the legal system in The Brothers Karamazov is not a sacred representation of justice; it is the manifestation of a secularized dogma, a modern Leviathan. The court has assumed the judgmental capacity emptied of God, but has become an institution that has closed itself off to criticism and taken refuge in singular truth narratives.

Zosima and the Loss of Conscientious Justice

Positioning itself against the court institution in the novel with wisdom and spiritual depth, Zosima argues that the essence of justice lies not in an external legal system, but in the inner conscience of the individual. Zosima’s understanding that “everyone is guilty of everyone else” draws law to the plane of an interpersonal relationship. Here justice can be achieved not through the cold rationality of law, but through moral responsibility, empathy, and spiritual purification. This summarizes Dostoyevsky’s fundamental critique of the legal system: modern law neglects the soul, but justice cannot be made soulless.