LAW214 Lecture Notes - Lecture 1: Jurisprudence, Critical Race Theory, Legal Realism
15 Mar 2020
School
Course
Professor
Document Summary
Jurisprudence is generally conceived of as the attempt to understand thee social institution of law from the perspective of philosophy. The greatest question is whether jurisprudence is an analytical enterprise or a normative enterprise. Positivists put the social aspects of law center-stage and that they believe that moral reasoning is not necessarily needed to ascertain the existence and content of the law. Natural law theorists believe that law and morality are necessarily linked, while acknowledging that the way in which dworking, finnis and fuller spell out the nature of this connection is very different. An understanding of critical and extra-disciplinary perspectives on the law promotes awareness of the historical, social and economic context in which law operates, and fosters the critical cast of minds that typifies the educated lawyer. The perspective provided by jurisprudence is an indispensable prerequisite to an adequate understanding of the law. Positive legal theory (opposed to normative legal theory tells us what is the case)
