Jurisprudence Commons^™

Critical Legal Theory And The Politics Of Pragmatism, Peter D. Swan

Dalhousie Law Journal

In this century mainstream legal scholarship in the United States has been subjected to various "crises of confidence" over the nature of the adjudication process. One of the key features of more traditional legal scholarship has been a belief in legal texts such as the constitution, statutes and precedents which are said to possess discrete and objective meaning capable of being discovered by objective detached observers. This belief in the authority of the text has been most clearly expressed in American constitutional law scholarship which has been dominated until recently by the quest to reveal the public moral values that …

Nomos And Thanatos (Part A). The Killing Fields: Modern Law And Legal Theory, Richard F. Devlin

Dalhousie Law Journal

Law, is so far as it sanctions the coercive power of the state, enables people to do frightening - even deadly - things to each other. Contemporary jurisprudence, the explanatory and justificatory voice of legal practice, fails to interrogate law's interconnection with violence and death and therefore, by a sin of omission, legitimizes humankind's mutual inhumanity. The end result is jurisprudential tolerance of, and acquiescence in, societies underpinned by violence. By identifying the nexus between community (nomos) and death (thanatos), this, admittedly speculative, essay attempts to raise the possibility of a discourse, practice and society that can encourage, reflect and …

Sources Of Judicial Distrust Of Social Science Evidence: A Comparison Of Social Science And Jurisprudence, Constance R. Lindman

Indiana Law Journal

No abstract provided.

Mastery, Slavery, And Emancipation, Guyora Binder

Journal Articles

Hegel's dialectic of master and slave in the Phenomenology of Mind portrays a master unable to win genuine recognition from a slave because unwilling to confer it. The dialectic implies that freedom has to be conceived as association based on mutual respect, rather than independence. This article offers a communitarian interpretation of emancipation inspired by Hegel's dialectic of master and slave. It proceeds from an account of slave society which, like Hegel's dialectic, equates slavery with the denial of social recognition. This account argues that the experience of slave society led both the masters and the slaves to conceive of …

Listening To Tribal Legends: An Essay On Law And The Scientific Method, Nancy Levit

Faculty Works

Much of jurisprudence is storytelling, recounting tales of what has gone before; improvising and crafting new stories of legal theory from old ones. Useful kernels are passed from one generation of legal thinkers to the next. Like tribal legends, the messages in many stories of jurisprudence can be understood only by a select audience. Legends often come with morals; theories of jurisprudence often impart prescription for living within the law. Jurisprudence, like legends, concerns fundamental issues, confronts cosmic questions and weaves in magic. Sometimes both possess humor as well.

Unfortunately, some modern versions of jurisprudential theories have become anecdotal. The …

Contradiction And Denial, Pierre Schlag

Publications

No abstract provided.

Some Reasons For A Restoration Of Natural Law Jurisprudence, Charles E. Rice

Journal Articles

The growing influence of utilitarianism and legal positivism in American jurisprudence today and the decline of natural law have produced an ominous shift in the foundation of our legal system. This shift is illustrated by various courts' approaches to momentous legal issues of the Twentieth Century such as abortion and euthanasia. Ultimately, legal positivism is unacceptable as a jurisprudential framework because it provides no inherent limits on the power of the state and no basis for determining what is just. In contrast, the natural law provides a jurisprudential framework that both guides and limits the civil law. It therefore is …

Missing Pieces: A Cognitive Approach To Law, Pierre Schlag

Publications

No abstract provided.

Can Any Legal Theory Constrain Any Judicial Decision?, Anthony D'Amato

University of Miami Law Review

No abstract provided.

Government "Largesse" And Constitutional Rights: Some Paths Through And Around The Swamp, Seth F. Kreimer

All Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.