LAW 786: Comparative Jurisprudence
This course is structured around two issues: (1) the notion of law as a discrete entity - law, that is, as something separate from both politics and from other academic disciplines, and (2) the question of what makes for good judicial decision-making. The course begins by considering the ideas of two European legal positivists - Hans Kelsen and H.L.A. Hart - and then moves to an analysis of American legal realism. Finally, students examine the sorts of responses that the positivist and realist traditions have provoked, and the shared jurisprudential dilemmas and concerns at the heart of European and American legal theory embodied in these responses. [1 credit hour]
