Providing balanced coverage of abortion, sexual harassment, censorship and pornography, and other timely and controversial subjects, this pathbreaking anthology is the first to offer a comprehensive introduction to feminist legal philosophy. An important resource for courses in women's studies, philosophy, law, sociology, and political science, it provides many stimulating insights into essential topics in jurisprudence, such as the nature and justification of law, judicial reasoning and the process of adjudication, the connection between law and equality, and freedom and (...) justice. (shrink)

One of the main purposes of feminist jurisprudence is to create or find better ways of being and living for women through the analysis, critique, and use of law. Rich work has emerged, and continues to emerge, from feminist theorists exploring conceptions of the self, personhood, identity and subjectivity that could be used to form a basic unit in law and politics. In this article, it is argued that a strong sense of human subjectivity needs to be (...) retained to enable the human potentiality of women and men to flourish. This can be done in a way which is not essentialist, yet does not dissolve the subject out of existence, issues pertinent to feminist jurisprudence in recent years. (shrink)

Providing balanced coverage of abortion, sexual harassment, censorship and pornography, and other timely and controversial subjects, this pathbreaking anthology is the first to offer a comprehensive introduction to feminist legal philosophy. An important resource for courses in women's studies, philosophy, law, sociology, and political science, it provides many stimulating insights into essential topics in jurisprudence, such as the nature and justification of law, judicial reasoning and the process of adjudication, the connection between law and equality, and freedom and (...) justice. (shrink)

Drucilla Cornell’s singular approach to feminist jurisprudence braided together psychoanalysis, deconstruction, and liberal legalism to formulate a simultaneously radical and practical remedy for women’s sexual subjection. Crossing epistemological and methodological divides in a disciplined and creative way, her brilliant work charted a path through the Scylla and Charybdis of over-regulation sacrificing freedom and libertarianism sacrificing equality.

Twenty years ago, when feminism was younger and greener, crides who thought the movement was sinking into a quagmire of unscientific irrationality had a relatively easy time in making out their case. In the first place, many feminists were themselves claiming to have rejected both science and reason, along with morality and all other such male devices for the oppression of women. And, furthermore, this position was a relatively easy one for the skeptical outsider to attack. Unless feminists could say (...) such things as that the present treatment of women was morally wrong, or prevailing ideas about their nature false or unfounded, or traditional reasoning about their position confused or fallacious, it was difficult to see on what basis they could rest the feminist case. And, of course, as they did say such things, all the time, it was obvious that any systematic attempt to reject ethics and rationality was systematically undercut by feminists' own arguments. (shrink)

: This essay explores how early approaches in feminist aesthetics drew on concepts honed in the field of feminist legal theory, especially conceptions of oppression and equality. I argue that by importing these feminist legal concepts, many early feminist accounts of how art is political depended largely on a distinctly liberal version of politics. I offer a critique of liberal feminist aesthetics, indicating ways recent work in the field also turns toward critical feminist aesthetics (...) as an alternative. (shrink)

This essay explores how early approaches in feminist aesthetics drew on concepts honed in the field of feminist legal theory, especially conceptions of oppression and equality. I argue that by importing these feminist legal concepts, many early feminist accounts of how art is political depended largely on a distinctly liberal version of politics. I offer a critique of liberal feminist aesthetics, indicating ways recent work in the field also turns toward critical feminist aesthetics as (...) an alternative. (shrink)

This essay demonstrates, and critiques, the pervasiveness of economic assumptions in the jurisprudence of privacy in US constitutional law as it extends from birth control and abortion rights to the so-called right to die. Finding in these cases metaphors of neoliberal productive practices and the assumption of the self as human capital, the self understood as a site of investment rather than a repository of worth, the essay brings privacy law into conversation with Kristin Luker's empirical work on abortion (...) politics and teenage pregnancy. The essay does not treat the right to die as a moral or political problem to be resolved, but is instead interested in the revelatory character of the jurisprudence of privacy — namely, in what it can tell us about the contemporary political economic order. Are recent developments in contemporary political economy, in the emerging neoliberal order, potentially illiberal? (shrink)

Utilising literature as a serious source of challenges to questions in philosophy and law, this book provides a fresh perspective not only upon the inculcation of the legal subject, but also upon the relationship between modernism, postmodernism and how such concepts might evolve in the construction of community ethics. The creation and role of the legal subject is just one aspect of jurisprudential enquiry now attracting much attention. How do moral values act upon the subject? How do moral 'systems' impinge (...) upon the subject - jurist and judged - throughout the 20th century, when religious values are called into question, when 'existential' doubt prevails? To what extent do issues of gender and identity inform these questions? Many sources can provide insights into these issues: this book intends to concentrate upon fiction as just such a resource. However it is not just another law and literature compilation. Spanning the last century, each chapter will attempt to fulfil four objectives: to identify key texts in relation to a given period; to look for linked legal and philosophical developments from that period; to establish fresh links from these sources regarding concrete doctrinal, or practical legal questions, and finally draw a more general inference about the legal subject and the frequently less evident feminine citizen-subject. Central to this approach will be the consideration of contemporary case law and legal materials as social documents of the relationship between law and the wider community. (shrink)

This book brings together new work by some of the foremost writers in the health care law arena. It presents exciting new insights,drawing on feminist theory and methodology to further our understanding of health care law. Whilst the book makes a real contribution to both feminist debates and the analysis of this area of law, it is also accessible to the undergraduate student who is approaching this area of legal scholarship and feminist jurisprudence for the first (...) time. Its focus is not merely on those issues which have traditionally excited feminist attention, but also includes those subjects which have proved of less apparent interest such as confidentiality, medical research, medical negligence and professional discipline. (shrink)

Preparation for the Study of Theories of Law: Non-Universality of Law, Irreconcilable Epistemologies, Ideological Incipience; Theories in Metaphysical-Rational Epistemology: Divine and Prophetic Theories; Natural Law: Early Hindu, Chinese, Greek, Roman, and Modern; Theories in Idealist Epistemology; Theories in Empiricist Epistemology; Positivist: Early Hindu, Chinese, Later Bentham, Austin, Kelsen, Hart; Historical Von Savigny, Maine, Marx and Engels; Sociological Jhering, Ehrlich, Duguit, Jurisprudence of Interests, Free Law; Psychological Petrazycki; American Realist; Philosophical Framework; Expressions; Scandinavian Realist; Phenomenological; The Critical Legal Studies and (...) its Offshoots: Critical Legal Studies, Feminist Jurisprudence, Critical Race Theory; Legal Polycentricity. (shrink)

General aspects of jurisprudence -- Precursors of modern jurisprudence -- Natural law -- Transcendental idealism -- Utilitarianism -- Legal positivism -- Historical jurisprudence -- The sociological movement in jurisprudence -- Authority -- Scandinavian realism -- American realism -- Contemporary american jurisprudence -- Rights -- Law and morality -- Feminist jurisprudence.

This textbook presents a clear exploration of the historical developments and ideas that give modern thinking its distinctive shape. It guides students through the rival standpoints on jurisprudence from the origins of Western jurisprudential thought and the classical tradition to the emergence of 'modern' political thought. Chapters on Hart, Fuller, Rawls, Dworkin and Finnis lead the reader systematically through the terrain of modern legal philosophy, tracing the issues back to fundamental questions of philosophy, and indicating lines of criticism that (...) result in a fresh and original perspective on the subject. The third edition includes a new chapter on feminist legal scholarship and non-Western approaches. Praise for the previous editions: 'An ideal starting place for anyone interested in, or studying, legal philosophy... Its simple but ambitious aim to provide a concise and accessible guide is easily achieved.' (Student Law Journal) 'A decent choice for an introductory course on jurisprudence, or for a serious student who wishes to study on his or her own.' (Canadian Law Library). (shrink)

At the intersection of law, feminism and philosophy, this book analyses the ways in which certain bodies and 'selves' continue to be treated as monstrous aberrations from the 'ideal' figure or norm. Employing contemporary feminist philosophy to rethink accepted legal ideas, the book is divided into three sections. The first focuses on the different relational ontologies of philosophers Adriana Cavarero and Christine Battersby - also considering their work via a third term: Spinoza. The second turns to diverse feminist (...) engagements with the social contract theorists. The third section employs insights from throughout the book to focus more explicitly on law - and, in particular privacy law and the so-called 'wrongful birth' cases. Bringing together more than twenty years of sustained reflection, this book offers an insightful account of how contemporary feminist philosophy can contribute to a richer understanding of law. It will be of enormous interest to scholars and students working in the areas of legal theory, feminist thought and philosophy. (shrink)

This collection breaks new ground in four key areas of feminist social thought: the sex/gender debates; challenges to liberalism/equality; feminist ethics; and feminist perspectives on global ethics and politics in the 21st century. Altogether, the essays provide an innovative look at feminist philosophy while making substantive contributions to current debates in gender theory, ethics, and political thought.

The first and only jurisprudence textbook to put African ideas, authors, and texts into conversation with those from the Western tradition, now with revised and expanded discussions of especially natural law theory, legal realism, postmodernism, critical legal studies, critical race theory, feminism, and the philosophy of punishment, along with new lists of additional readings and of web resources. 430 pp.

This new edition of Jurisprudence brings the book fully up to date and incorporates the following new topics: Utilitarianism, Scandinavian realism, Feminism, Liberalism, the New Critics, and the Hart v Dworkin debate. It also includes a separate chapter on Dworkin's Law's Empire, and the previous chapter on Rights has been substantially revised, to make this a useful and highly readable addition to the student's library.

This book is designed for use in courses in law schools and university departments of philosophy. It can serve as a text for basic and advanced courses and seminars. Readings include excerpts of classic works of Aristotle, Aquinas, Locke, Hobbes, Kant, Bentham, and Austin. Provided also are excerpts from standard works of twentieth century philosophers. The book explores current legal discourse with readings on topics such as sociobiology, Islamic law, the legal process school, legal feminism, critical legal studies, intersectionality and (...) gender identity theories, law and economics, and new private law theories. It reprints leading cases on natural rights/human rights and readings from online blogs, op-ed essays, news stories and internet publications, as well as drawing on literary treatment of topics relevant to legal philosophy. (shrink)

This book reviews the classical schools of jurisprudence with particular reference to their linguistic presuppositions, and summarises an alternative account based on Paris school semiotics. Detailed ToC available from linked web page. NOT available from Amazon.

: Feminist legal theory provides a healthy skepticism toward legal doctrine and insists that we reexamine even formally gender-neutral rules to uncover problematic assumptions behind them. The article first outlines feminist legal theory from the perspectives of liberal, cultural, and radical feminism. Examples of how each theory influences legal practice, case law, and legislation are highlighted. Each perspective is then applied to a contemporary bioethical issue, egg donation. Following a brief discussion of the common themes shared by (...) class='Hi'>feminist jurisprudence, the article incorporates a narrative reflecting on the integration of the common feminist themes in the context of the passage of the Maryland Health Care Decisions Act. The article concludes that gender does matter and that an understanding of feminist legal theory and practice will enrich the analysis of contemporary bioethical issues. (shrink)

These questions lie at the heart of contemporary feminist theory, and in this collection they are addressed by a group of distinguished international scholars ...

Feminist legal scholars have never cut the first woman appointed to the Supreme Court of Canada as much slack as the second. Yet the first, Justice Bertha Wilson, introduced the contextual method into the Court’s jurisprudence. Her approach to contextualism is consistent with one of three feminist legal methods that Katharine T. Bartlett identifies. More specifically, it is consistent with Bartlett’s feminist practical reasoning. However, Justice Wilson’s contextualism is not without its critics. The most challenging, Ruth (...) Colker, contends it must work in conjunction with a distinctive substantive principle. Justice Wilson took a different approach, aligning the contextual method with the constitutional principle of proportionality. Thus construed, this paper argues, contextualism represents a new approach to feminist judging. (shrink)

This book uses contemporary feminist insights to examine aspects of the classic social contractarians' arguments, concentrating upon the work of Hobbes, Spinoza ...

Details developments in feminist theory since 1970, with chapters on aspects such as feminist social theory, political theory, and jurisprudence, black feminisms, post-colonial feminist theory, lesbian theory, and feminist linguistic theories. Other topics include psychoanalytic feminist theory, postmodernism and feminism, feminist literary theory, feminist media and film theory, and women's studies. Annotation copyrighted by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR.

In this revised edition, two distinguished philosophers have extended and strengthened the most authoritative text available on the philosophy of law and jurisprudence. While retaining their comprehensive coverage of classical and modern theory, Murphy and Coleman have added new discussions of the Critical Legal Studies movement and feminist jurisprudence, and they have strengthened their treatment of natural law theory, criminalization, and the law of torts. The chapter on law and economics remains the best short introduction to that (...) difficult, controversial, and influential topic.Students will appreciate the careful organization and clear presentation of complicated issues as well as the emphasis on the relevance of both law and legal theory to contemporary society. (shrink)

The Ethic of Care was one of the most significant strands of the ferment of revolutionary ideas and practices which emerged during the period from, roughly, the mid 1960s to the early 1990s. The feminist critique of rights based discourse and the social imaginary which it inspired shared many of the features of other critical movements. Further, elements of its utopian vision of a society grounded in connectedness, compassion, reciprocity and particularism, its anti-legalism and call for a relational (...) class='Hi'>jurisprudence have either been realised or remain influential. Its critique of law is therefore of more than historical interest. It was, however, flawed by its apparent acceptance of the law's claims to impartiality and neutrality. The main part of the paper will, therefore, be a discussion of the development of the English common law, in which it will be argued that the persistence of archaic discourses, together with law's imbrication in all aspects of social life, necessarily generates reasoning which is not grounded in impartial, abstract principles but is rather routinely contextualised by preexisting power relations. It will further argue that the critique overlooked the extent to which the discourse and structures of community and the practice of 'care' have been sources of oppression, whilst aspects of formal legal discourse are fundamental to improving women's status. This point is highlighted by the role of neo-liberal and neo-conservative discourses and policies in realising some features of 'Difference Feminist' thought, and the paper will conclude by considering how the erosion of rights in England and Wales is impacting particularly severely on women. (shrink)

This comprehensive and important volume includes contributions by activists, journalists, lawyers and scholars from twenty-one countries. The essays map the directions the movement for women's rights is taking--and will take in the coming decades--and the concomittant transformation of prevailing notions of rights and issues. They address topics such as the rapes in former Yugoslavia and efforts to see that a War Crimes Tribunal responds; domestic violence; trafficking of women into the sex trade; the persecution of lesbians; female genital mutilation; and (...) reproductive rights. (shrink)

A collection of the author's new and reprinted papers in general jurisprudence. Chapters: -/- Introduction: A Philosophy of Legal Philosophy -/- Law, As Such 1. The Concept of Law Revisited 2. Law as a Means 3. Custom and Convention at the Foundations of Law 4. Realism and the Sources of Law 5. Feminism in Jurisprudence -/- Law and Morality 6. The Germ of Justice 7. The Inseparability of Law and Morals 8. The Morality in Law 9. The Role (...) of a Judge 10. Should Law Improve Morality? -/- The Demands of Law 11. Hume on Allegiance 12. Associative Obligations and the State 13. The Forces of Law 14. The Duty to Govern. (shrink)

In the last decade a body of literature has been written on the phenomenon of `Islamic Feminism,' which closely links it to a human rights discourse in Muslim countries. The term `Islamic Feminism' may seem a paradox, but by using Iran as a case study this article demonstrates that the idea of feminisms in Muslim societies, rather than being paradoxical, is actually a legitimate and potentially powerful force. In this paper Iranian feminists are categorized into four groups: Islamic state feminists, (...) Islamic non-state feminists, Muslim feminists and secular feminists. Each group is differentiated according to their interpretations of fiqh (Islamic Jurisprudence), their use of ijtihad (independent reasoning) and their relations to human rights and to the government. The novel concept of feminist dependency paradigm is also explored. The dependency paradigm investigates the multi-layered dependencies of the feminists to the state, to foreign funders, intellectuals, and to the family. (shrink)

In this article the author revisits Carol Smart’s 1989 publication Feminism and the power of law. She engages with Smart’s main claims by way of a number of other thinkers. Following Marianne Constable’s description of contemporary American legal thought as socio-legal, the author tentatively considers if it could be argued that some strains in contemporary legal feminism that adopted a sociological method resulted in a similar absence of justice that concerns Constable. Smart’s caution against the development of a feminist (...) jurisprudence is critically analysed with the benefit of hindsight. Drawing on Deleuze and Guattari, Foucault and Goodrich, the author tentatively considers the becoming of a feminist jurisprudence as a minor jurisprudence. What we most lack is a belief in the world, we’ve quite lost the world, it’s been taken from us. (Deleuze 1995, 176)Sociology takes social creation to be the whole of what is and will be. (Constable 1994a, 589). (shrink)

The object of this essay is to explore the central role played by the ‘ethic of care’ in debates within and beyond feminist legal theory. The author claims that the ethic of care has attracted feminist legal scholars in particular, as a means of resolving the theoretical, political and strategic difficulties to which the perceived ‘crisis of subjectivity’ in feminist theory has given rise. She argues that feminist legal scholars are peculiarly placed in relation to this (...) crisis because of their reliance on the social ‘woman’ whose interests are the predominant concern of feminist legal engagement. With the problematisation of subjectivity, the object of feminist legal attention disappears and it is in attempts to deflect the negative political consequences of this that the ethic of care has been invoked, the author argues, unsuccessfully. The essay concludes with suggestions as to how the feminist project in law might proceed in the wake of the crisis of subjectivity and the failure of the ethic of care to resolve it. (shrink)

In this article the author revisits the question of how feminist theory/theories could address questions regarding universalism, sameness, difference, and the quest for justice. She reconsiders the quest for justice and equality for women and the possibilities of a feminist perspective on justice and a feminist `community'. The three feminist theorists that she discusses are Martha Nussbaum, Drucilla Cornell, and Iris Marion Young. Nussbaum is closer to a liberal defense of universal values – Cornell and Young (...) stand critical of liberalism and focus on sublimity, dignity, and asymmetrical reciprocity. The author supports the perspective of the latter two theorists and applies these perspectives to aspects of South African equality jurisprudence. She also considers critically the extent to which the Draft Protocol to the African Charter on Human and People's Rights on the Rights of Women in Africa breaks with liberal universalism and sameness. To the end she supports a notion of` slowing down' in order to protect women's freedom and dignity, to approach each other with wonder and respect. (shrink)

Women’s entry into the legal academy in significant numbers—first as students, then as faculty—was a 1970s and 1980s phenomenon. During those decades, women in law schools struggled: first, for admission and inclusion as individual students on a formally equal footing with male students; then for parity in their numbers in classes and on faculties; and, eventually, for some measure of substantive equality across various parameters, including their performance and evaluation both in and in front of the classroom, as well as (...) in the quality of their experiences as students and faculty members and in the benefits to be reaped from their tenure. This part of the story of women’s entry into the legal academy in the 1970s and 1980s—a story of attempted admission, then inclusion, then integration and assimilation, and then, finally, equality—is now a familiar one, at least in broad outline. It is not, in its entirety, an uplifting story. According to a raft of articles produced by women law students in the 1980s, 1990s, and 2000s, women law students during those decades participated less in the classroom, were called on and responded to differently when they did participate, suffered from more law-school-induced anxiety disorders and other mental health issues, graduated with lower GPAs and less law review experience, published fewer notes and filled fewer editorial positions on those journals, held fewer leadership positions overall while in law school, and had far more difficulties connecting with mentors, teachers, and would-be recommenders among the faculty than male students. Women law professors during those decades were tenured at significantly lower rates than men and, particularly at high prestige schools and at schools with fewer female faculty among the tenured ranks, were hired at lower rates that did not reflect their number in the pool of qualified applicants, had trouble asserting or maintaining authority in the classroom or being perceived as having authority, taught lower-prestige courses and received low teaching evaluations, and, like their students, were published far less frequently in the major and most prestigious law reviews. Much of this, albeit not all, has not changed much for either students or faculty. As women in law schools enter the posttenure and midcareer phase, many of the old problems persist while new ones appear: women faculty are invited to participate on panels less often than men, and both women students and faculty are underrepresented as authors in law reviews. Although gender-neutral parental leave is now available to faculty at most law schools, many such policies are still ad hoc. There is considerable worry, although no hard evidence, over whether men disproportionately use the time off to write rather than care for children. Women are still disproportionately overrepresented in some fields and underrepresented or unrepresented in others, and those fields correlate in unsurprising ways with levels of prestige: the more women in a field, the less prestigious. As elsewhere in the workforce, women faculty in legal education suffer from sexual harassment, most of which is unremedied. Women still suffer a pay gap in law schools that remains unaddressed at most universities, as it does elsewhere in academia. There is a sizeable literature on these depressing phenomena that stubbornly do not seem to abate. In these comments, however, I want to focus on another, less appreciated, part of the story of women’s entry into the legal academy in the 1970s and 1980s: the emergence of a body of scholarship—sometimes called feminist legal theory—produced by some of these women legal scholars over the same time period. The story I want to focus on, in other words, is not that of second- or third-wave women’s struggles within the academy, either for admission, acceptance, assimilation, or equality in law schools. Rather, this Article focuses on the story of the scholarship some of those second-wave assimilated women produced once they got there. Feminist jurisprudence, understood largely as scholarship on issues pertaining to gender equality, was launched in the 1970s, endures today, and continues to shape debates. Feminist legal theory, however, was in effect a subfield within feminist jurisprudence and, as its name implies, was an attempt to fashion a broad- based theoretical account of the relationship of law in liberal legal regimes to women’s subordination, patriarchy, and gender and sexual inequality— particularly in a post–civil rights era, when women enjoyed broad access to rights of formal equality, reproductive liberty, and liberal antidiscrimination law. Feminist legal theory so understood—a body of scholarship in search of a theoretical understanding of the relation of law to women’s subordination or, more simply, of law and patriarchy—was birthed in the 1970s, nurtured in the 1980s, and matured in the 1990s. I suggest in this Article that it is now seemingly in decline, and may soon disappear altogether. The reasons for this trajectory, I believe, are to date unexplored. Some reasons are fairly self-evident. Feminist legal theory was a product of three time-specific factors peculiar to the 1970s and 1980s: it reflected the political and the legal struggles of second-wave feminism. The critical theory schools were, to varying degrees, present or thriving in the academy in the 1970s and 1980s, within which feminist legal theory was birthed, grew, and then coexisted with critical theory, albeit at times very uneasily; and this feminist theory reflected second-wave women faculty and students’ mixed experiences of assimilation, success, and alienation in law schools themselves, as briefly recited above. Those three factors—the background politics, the presence of critical theory in law schools, and the differences in women’s experience of those schools—are all themselves either disappearing or dissipating in felt urgency, albeit in different ways and at different speeds, and that dissipation clearly is a part of the story of feminist legal theory’s decline. There are other reasons for its decline as well, however. Some are internal to feminism and feminist theory, and some pertain to the changing nature of legal scholarship from the 1980s to the present. I explore these reasons in Part II below. The story of the development of a distinctively feminist legal theory during the 1970s through the 1990s, and the story of its decline in the 2000s, is of obvious relevance to the history of second- and third-wave feminism. It should also be of interest for what it reveals about the nature of legal scholarship as it was understood, received, and produced in those decades. Its decline likewise reveals something about the changing nature of legal scholarship and the legal academy today. Thus, one conclusion I draw is that the feminist legal theory of the 1970s through the 1990s—regardless of the truth or lasting power of its claims—stands as an example of a type of legal scholarship that was somewhat distinctive to those decades. That form of legal scholarship, furthermore, likely can only emanate from the legal academy. For a host of reasons, we are currently in danger of losing this entire genre of intellectual work, which would be the polity’s loss, not just feminism’s or the legal academy’s. (shrink)

The Maputo Protocol, adopted in 2003, was intended to counterbalance the normative deficiencies of the African Charter with respect to women’s rights. However, 15 years down the line, there is not much case law on the Protocol. The ECOWAS Court made its first pronouncement on the Protocol in 2017 in Dorothy Njemanze & 3 Others v. The Federal Republic of Nigeria. This paper analyses three gender-based violence decisions by the Ecowas Court: Dorothy Njemanze, Aminata Diantou Diane and Mary Sunday cases. (...) The paper examines the potential of the Protocol and the due diligence principle in influencing the Ecowas Court’s jurisprudence on women’s rights and makes recommendations. (shrink)

Fully updated and revised by James Penner and Emmanuel Melissaris, McCoubrey & White's Textbook on Jurisprudence clearly breaks down the complexities of this often daunting yet fascinating subject. Sophisticated ideas are explained concisely and with clarity, ensuring the reader is aware of the subtleties of the subject yet not overwhelmed. With chapters dedicated to both key concepts and leading theorists, this text takes a wide-ranging look at jurisprudence and places central ideas in context. In particular this text centres (...) around one of the leading theorists, H.L.A Hart, and considers the landscape of jurisprudence in relation to his seminal The Concept of Law, looking at the key ideas which influenced him and considering the response to his work. Coverage of post-modern and feminist legal theory is also included, alongside discussion of key theorists such as Hobbes, Kant, and Rawls.Logically organised to support the topics commonly taught on jurisprudence and legal theory courses, this text provides an easy-to-follow and digestible account of this wide-ranging subject, making it the ideal companion text for further reading and research throughout your course. (shrink)

This article explores the relationship between neoconservative values and neoliberalism in American jurisprudence through a critique of the US Supreme Court’s Hobby Lobby decision. The article uncovers how the Court imposes market-oriented logic on religious expression and in the process spiritualizes economic activity. In this way neoliberal rationality is intertwined with neoconservative values. For example, exercising religion through corporatization can be understood as a neoconservative moderation of the corrupting influence of excessive neoliberal individualism. Finally, while the decision furthers employer (...) control of workers’ reproduction, the Court’s proposed workaround—a direct government contraceptives program—would undermine that control and points to another, more emancipatory response to the problems of neoliberalism. (shrink)

Critical Legal Theory and the Challenge of Feminism provides both a thorough overview and a refinement of the ideas that underlie critical legal theory. Arguing with the rigor of analytic philosophy and the alertness to paradoxes characteristic of deconstructive philosophy, Matthew Kramer begins by exploring the tangled relations between metaphysics and politics. He then attempts to transform the discourses of the critical legal studies movement by laying out a framework of five general themes: contradictions, contingency, patterning, perspective, and ideology. Kramer (...) calls for a more sophisticated awareness of their paradoxes, explaining why the paradoxes are by no means disabling or demobilizing. Finally, Kramer explores some of feminist theory's major controversies and problems, and argues that feminist theory can profit greatly by giving due attention to inescapable paradoxes. The book is an important contribution to political philosophy, jurisprudence, feminist philosophy and metaphysics, with powerful implications for epistemology and literary theory. (shrink)

In this article the author revisits Carol Smart’s 1989 publication Feminism and the power of law. She engages with Smart’s main claims by way of a number of other thinkers. Following Marianne Constable’s description of contemporary American legal thought as socio-legal, the author tentatively considers if it could be argued that some strains in contemporary legal feminism that adopted a sociological method resulted in a similar absence of justice that concerns Constable. Smart’s caution against the development of a feminist (...) jurisprudence is critically analysed with the benefit of hindsight. Drawing on Deleuze and Guattari, Foucault and Goodrich, the author tentatively considers the becoming of a feminist jurisprudence as a minor jurisprudence.What we most lack is a belief in the world, we’ve quite lost the world, it’s been taken from us. Sociology takes social creation to be the whole of what is and will be. (shrink)

This paper has arisen from my interest in questions ofsubjectivity of primary concern to contemporaryfeminist jurisprudence. Rather than side with anyparticular view represented in the debates surroundingthese questions, I have used Foucault's concept ofepisteme to explore the tradition of feministlegal thought. By focusing upon seventeenth-centurywomen's writings in which the earliest statementslinking law to women's oppression are to be found, thepaper argues that knowledge claims about law'sassociation with women's oppression are predicated notupon the positing of a sovereign feministconsciousness, but upon (...) the specific positivities ofknowledge which existed at the time. Theunderstanding of the birth of the feminist legaldiscourse in terms of the specific conditions of itspossibility, although historically contextualised,raises questions about the hitherto seeminglyunassailable adherence to subjectivist epistemologywhich the current feminist engagement with lawmaintains. (shrink)

The object of this paper is to explore the possibility defending women's rights (or, more broadly, expressing women's concerns) within a framework of Islamic concepts and ideas. This is to be accomplished by introducing a number of methodological principles that can, and (for feminists) should govern the practice of "religious interpretation" (ijtihad) which Muslims have used throughout the centuries to adapt Qur'anic and Islamic teachings to changing realities and circumstances.

This article explore the limitations of progressive and feminist legal change through a study of the development of gender-based refugee policy in Canada. I argue that the actual impact of feminist and progressive legal change is determined in interaction with the wider bureaucratic and administrative contexts of its implementation; administrative strategies and bureaucratic procedures may, in fact, capably undermine the potentially expansive effects of progressive jurisprudence. As I will show, feminist legal interventions in Canada’s refugee policy (...) did not increase actual access to refugee protection. Not only were these interventions delivered in a decidedly limited administrative form, they occurred simultaneously with highly innovative and coordinated bureaucratic practices that limited the access of large groups of refugee claimants to protection. Thus, while the Canadian refugee system expanded jurisprudentially, access to this system was tightly restricted through administrative and bureaucratic measures. (shrink)