This book examines responsibility and luck as these issues arise in tort law, criminal law, and distributive justice. In revealing how the problems that arise in tort and criminal law as well as distributive justice invite structurally parallel solutions, the author also shows the deep connection between individual responsibility and social equality. This is a challenging and provocative book that will be of special interest to moral and political philosophers, legal theorists, and political scientists.

Do citizens have an obligation to obey the law? This book differs from standard approaches by shifting from the language of obedience (orders) to that of deference (normative judgments). Though the focus is on political obligation, Philip Soper approaches that issue indirectly by developing a more general account of when deference is due to the views of others. The book defends a more general theory of ethics; one whose scope extends beyond the question of political obligation to questions of duty in the case of law, promises, fair play and friendship.

Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr. (1841-1935) is, arguably the most important American jurist of the twentieth century, and his essay The Path of the Law, first published in 1898, is the seminal work in American legal theory. This volume brings together some of the most distinguished legal scholars from the United States and Canada to examine competing understandings of The Path of the Law and its implications for contemporary American jurisprudence. For the reader's convenience, the essay is republished in an Appendix. The book will be of interest to professionals and students in the philosophy,...

How is a legitimate state possible? Obedience, coercion, and intrusion are three ideas that seem inseparable from all government and seem to render state authority presumptively illegitimate. This book exposes three fallacies inspired by these ideas and in doing so challenges assumptions shared by liberals, libertarians, cultural conservatives, moderates, and Marxists. In three clear and tightly-argued essays William Edmundson dispels these fallacies and shows that living in a just state remains a worthy ideal. This is an important book for all philosophers, political scientists, and legal...

For several decades the work of Joel Feinberg has been the most influential in legal, political, and social philosophy in the English-speaking world. This volume honors that body of work by presenting fifteen original essays, many of them by leading legal and political philosophers, that explore the problems that have engaged Feinberg over the years. Among the topics covered are issues of autonomy, responsibility, and liability. It will be a collection of interest to anyone working in moral, legal, or political philosophy.

This collection brings together new essays by some of the most prominent scholars currently writing in commercial law theory. The essays address the foundations of efficiency analysis as the dominant theoretical paradigm in contemporary corporate and commercial law scholarship. The volume addresses such questions as: is moral theory irrelevant to efficiency analysis in these areas; if relevant, are morality and efficiency compatible? What is the best way of pursuing efficiency in corporate and commercial law? The volume reflects the most exciting work being done in contemporary legal theory....

This collection of new essays, written by some of the most eminent scholars in the field, examines the most central issues of property theory from a variety of perspectives. The essays discuss whether property may be dissipated or used imprudently with impunity, and analyze how a person's property should be distributed after death. They survey the current economic landscape of intellectual property and show that Locke's celebrated justification for private property falters when it comes to copyrights and patents. They also demonstrate how important it is that institutions of property be...

We live in a morally flawed world. Our lives are complicated by what other people do, and by the harms that flow from our social, economic, and political institutions. Our relations as individuals to these collective harms constitute the domain of complicity. This book examines the relationship between collective responsibility and individual guilt. It presents a rigorous philosophical account of the nature of our relations to the social groups in which we participate, and uses that account in a discussion of contemporary moral theory.

According to the natural law account of practical rationality, the basic reasons for actions are basic goods that are grounded in the nature of human beings. Practical rationality aims to identify and characterize reasons for action and to explain how choice between actions worth performing can be appropriately governed by rational standards. Natural Law and Practical Rationality is a defense of a contemporary natural law theory of practical rationality, demonstrating its inherent plausibility and engaging systematically with rival egoist, consequentialist, Kantian and virtue accounts.

Although the law of contract is largely settled, there is at present no widely-accepted comprehensive theory of its main principles and doctrines or of its normative basis. This collection of six full-length and original essays, written by some of the most eminent scholars in the field, explores the general theory of contract law from a variety of theoretical perspectives. While the essays build on past theoretical contributions, they also attempt to take contract theory further and suggest new and promising ways to develop theory of contract law.