Law and Politics

Catalog description

This course considers some fundamental and enduring problems about the nature of law and its relationship to society. Legal philosophers, judges, academic lawyers, and political scientists give very different answers to the following questions: What is law? Does law have a function and if so, what is it? Is there a relationship between law and morality? Do citizens have an obligation to comply with law, and if so, what is the nature of that obligation? How does that obligation arise? Do we have an obligation to comply with unjust laws? How should judges in a democratic society decide legal disputes? Our goal is to consider whether and how such questions might be answered. We will consider a variety of recent contributions to legal theory that draw from political and moral philosophy. Readings may be drawn from sources ranging from Ancient philosophy, to most important scholarly contributions and landmark cases in American law and society.