Subjects:

English Legal System, Jurisprudence

Contents:

1. Setting the bounds of law in modern society

2. Approaches to law in society

3. Law as social rules

4. Law prior to rules

5. Law as a system of rules

6. Social spheres

7. The reception of law

8. Law and coercion

9. Legal pluralism: parallel legal orders

10. Extended legal pluralism: informal legal orders

11. Does law have social functions?

12. The social value of law

13. Forms of modern legal orders

14. Social foundations of the modern legal form

15. Implementation and the architecture of law

16. Implementation: the legal and social environment

17. Change through the law: the contours of compliance

This addition to the Clarendon Law Series offers a comprehensive account of, and contribution to, the study of law in modern society. Written by a leading academic in the field, this book examines the underlying idea that the legal system is a highly developed social system which has a distinctive character and structure, and which shapes and influences behaviour.

This involves firstly, analysing the nature of law as a social formation itself and, secondly, examining the ways in which it interacts with other aspects of society. In the course of the book the work of legal and social theorists is analysed, and the text illustrated and authenticated by drawing on empirical research in the law and society tradition.

• Provides a succinct analysis of the main issues that arise in the relationship between law and society, thereby encouraging students to fully consider the role, and influence, of the legal system
• Explores how the law effects modern society with reference, and critical analysis of, the works of key legal and social theorists
• An authoritative and original introduction to the study of law and society, written by a highly respected and leading academic in the field