Jurisprudence Commons^™

Law Is Not (Best Considered) An Essentially Contested Concept, Kenneth M. Ehrenberg

Kenneth M Ehrenberg

I argue that law is not best considered an essentially contested concept. After first explaining the notion of essential contestability and disaggregating the concept of law into several related concepts, I show that the most basic and general concept of law does not fit within the criteria generally offered for essential contestation. I then buttress this claim with the additional explanation that essential contestation is itself a framework for understanding complex concepts and therefore should only be applied when it is useful to gain a greater understanding of uses of the concept to which it is applied (adducing criteria for …