Full Description
The third edition of Jurisprudence offers a logically structured, comprehensive, well-researched and accessible overview of legal theory and philosophy. Written primarily for undergraduate students, it examines and demystifies the discipline's major ideas, and promotes a richer understanding of the social, moral and economic dimensions of the law. By locating the major traditions of jurisprudence within the history of ideas, the author deepens students' understanding of the perennial debates about the nature and function of law and its relation to justice. Fully revised and updated, with new materials on all topics, Suri Ratnapala's Jurisprudence remains an essential text for students and researchers of jurisprudence and legal theory.
Contents
1. Introduction; Part I. Law As It Is: 2. British legal positivism: philosophical roots and command theories; 3. Herbert Hart's new beginning and new questions; 4. Germanic legal positivism: Hans Kelsen's quest for the pure theory of law; 5. Realism in legal theory; Part II. Law and Morality: 6. Natural law tradition from antiquity to the Enlightenment; 7. John Finnis' restatement of classical natural law; 8. Separation of law and morality; Part III. Social Dimensions of Law: 9. Sociological jurisprudence and sociology of law; 10. Radical jurisprudence: challenges to liberal legal theory; 11. Economic analysis of law; 12. Evolutionary jurisprudence; Part IV. Rights and Justice: 13. Fundamental legal conceptions: the building blocks of legal norms; 14. Justice.
