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Law

Faculty Scholarship

Boston University School of Law

Law and Society

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Full-Text Articles in Law

Habermas's Sociological And Normative Theory Of Law And Democracy: A Reply To Wirts, Flynn, And Zurn, Hugh Baxter Feb 2014

Habermas's Sociological And Normative Theory Of Law And Democracy: A Reply To Wirts, Flynn, And Zurn, Hugh Baxter

Faculty Scholarship

In "Between Facts and Norms" (1996) Habermas presents the more straightforward normative discourse theory of law and democracy, in terms of contemporary legal orders, and then examines, in terms of social theory, whether the theory is plausible, given the complex nature of today’s conditions. The following article focuses in particular on Habermas’ social theory. It is critical of Habermas’ idea of ‘the lifeworld’ and discusses whether the circulation-of-power model might be mapped onto the system – lifeworld model.


Patterns Of Courtroom Justice, Jessica Silbey Jan 2001

Patterns Of Courtroom Justice, Jessica Silbey

Faculty Scholarship

Any one film can sustain a myriad of compelling interpretations. A collection of films, however, sharing formal and substantive qualities, reveals a common effect more than a diversity of meanings. This essay traces the shared formal and substantive qualities of a group of films, as I name them 'trial films'. It documents this genre of film by identifying the genre's norms of viewing and identification. It also investigates the peculiar hybrid discourse of the trial film genre that combines both filmic and legal discursive practices to show how trial films cultivate support for the American system of law through its …