Normative legal theory is concerned with the ends and justifications for the law as a whole and for particular legal rules.  Previous entries in the legal have examined exemplars of the three great traditions in normative theory–consequentialist, deontological, and aretaic (or virtue-centered) perspectives.  There are important differences between these three families of theories at a […]

This book gives a brief description on the past, present and future of the public interest cases in India and abroad. It proves to be an excellent guide to the law students especially at beginning of their studies. Author Dr. Mamta Rao is currently a lecturer of Durgawati University, Jabalpur. She is eminent author who […]

The lawyer, 31-year-old Sapiyat Magomedova, represents victims of human rights abuses, including taking their cases to the European Court of Human Rights. Her colleagues at Omarov and Partners, the law firm she works for in Khasavyurt, Dagestan's second largest city, told Human Rights Watch that police officers beat Magomedova unconscious on the premises of the […]

The phrase "path dependency" is used to express the idea that history matters–choices made in the past can affect the feasibility (possibility or cost) of choices made in the future.  This entry in the Legal Theory Lexicon introduces this idea to law students, especially first-year law students, with an interest in legal theory. The General Idea of […]

Almost every law student get's some introduction to normative law and economics in their first year of law school.  One of the basic ideas of normative law and economics is that the law should be "efficient."  But what does efficiency mean?  For economists, "efficiency" is a technical idea–with only a tangential connection to the use of […]

F.W. Maitland, the famous legal historian wrote, “Such is the unity of all history that any one who endeavors to tell a piece of it must feel that his first sentence tears a seamless web.”  (A Prologue to a History of English Law, 14 L. Qtrly Rev. 13 (1898))  Maitland didn't actually say that the […]

Some of the key conceptual tools deployed by legal theorists are likely to be familiar to most law students from their undergraduate education.  One of these is the notion of the "social contract"–familiar from Hobbes, Locke, and Rousseau.  But unless you were an undergraduate philosophy major or have some graduate work in philosophy, you may […]

What is to be understood by 'rational legal argument'? To what extent can legal reasoning be rational? Is the demand for rationality in legal affairs justified? And what are the criteria of rationality in legal reasoning? The answer to these questions is not only of interest to legal theorists and philosophers of law. They are […]

On 17 December 2009, the Rome I Regulation (EU Regulation 593/2008) on the law applicable to contractual obligations comes into force and will be directly applicable in all EU Member States with the exception of Denmark. When we last reported on the draft Regulation, the UK was still considering whether to opt in. It decided […]

The death penalty is the ultimate denial of human rights. It is the premeditated and cold-blooded killing of a human being by the state. This cruel, inhuman and degrading punishment is done in the name of justice. It violates the right to life as proclaimed in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Amnesty International opposes […]

The principal legislation governing discrimination on the grounds of religion or belief in the UK is: Race Relations Act 1976 Employment Rights Act 1996 (especially sections 45 and 101 which protect shop and betting workers who do not wish to work on Sundays) Independent Schools (Employment of Teachers in Schools with a Religious Character) Regulations […]