Research Catalog

Title

Instrumentalism and American legal theory / Robert Samuel Summers.

Author

Summers, Robert S.

Publication

Ithaca, N.Y. : Cornell University Press, c1982.

Items in the Library & Off-site

Holdings

Details

Description

295 p.; 23 cm.

Subject

• Instrumentalism (Philosophy)
• Law > Philosophy
• Law > United States > History

Genre/Form

History.

Note

• Includes index.

Bibliography (note)

• Bibliography: p. 283-290.

Processing Action (note)

• committed to retain

Contents

• Preface -- General introduction -- The name "pragmatic instrumentalism" -- The American pragmatic instrumentalists -- Origins -- Importance of pragmatic instrumentalist theories -- "Legal realism" inappropriate as a name -- Organization of the book -- Part one : The elements of the law -- 1. Theory of value -- Maximal satisfaction of wants and interests -- A concern with consequences -- An empirical approach -- An emphasis on particulars ("context") -- 2. Means and goals -- Law as a social instrument -- Goals and goal-structures -- Behavioral models of goals and means -- Forms of law described (or stated) merely as means -- Law as a source and definer of goals -- Interaction of goals and means -- Part two: The creation and administration of valid law -- 3. Change, science, and the creation of law -- The creation of law -- methodology -- Some excesses and myopias -- Other issues in the theory of lawmaking -- 4. Valid law I -- official action --^
• The validity of law as determined by reference to official action -- Prescribing standards of validity -- a task for legal theorists? -- "The law in action" versus "the law in books" -- 5. Valid law II -- Predictions -- The predictive theory -- Motivations and virtues of predictivism as a theory of legal validity -- Deficiencies of robust predictivism as a theory of legal validity -- Deficiencies of robust predictivism as an account of good lawyering -- Other faults of predictivism -- Presuppositions of robust predictivism -- 6. Legal method -- The attack on formalism -- A. Comprehensiveness of preexisting law -- B. Extent and appropriateness of judicial lawmaking -- C. Considerations relevant in lawmaking -- D. Reality of valid existing law -- E. Appropriate generality of law -- F. In legal analysis: relative primacy of facts, things, and effects over unitary concepts and terminology -- G. Issues of interpretation and application: case law --^
• H. Issues of interpretation and application: written law -- I. "Deductivism" -- Tabular summary of the attack on formalism -- Other legal methods attacked by instrumentalists -- Criticism of instrumenalist method -- the common law's alleged indeterminacy -- Criticism of instrumentalist method -- the insufficient role for substantive reasons -- Criticism of instrumentalist method -- the animus toward generality -- 7. The separation of alw and morals -- On interpreting the "separationists" -- The substance law -- Scope of judicial lawmaking -- Standards for indentifying valid law -- Interpretation and other issues -- Part three: The implementation and functioning of law -- 8. Law's implementive "machinery" -- A preliminary inventory of law's resources -- Law as technology -- The unwisdom of technologial metaphors -- 9. The nature and role of personnel -- The personnel element in law -- Personnel versus precept -- Officials versus nonofficals -- "Decision theory" --^
• 10. Coercion, force, and direct official action -- Coercion and force -- Directness of official action -- Part four: the efficacy of law -- 11. Criterion for judging the success of a use of law -- The complex evaluative nature of efficacy judgments -- Further difficulties in applying an efficacy criterion -- The deficiencies of efficacy as a criterion of success -- Actual efficacy as a criterion of success and predicted efficacy as a justification standard -- differences and relationships -- 12. The limited efficacy of law -- Instrumentalism and law's limited efficacy -- A more systematic approach -- General conclusion -- Pragmatic instrumentalist theories about law and its use -- Distinctiveness of pragmatic instrumentalist theories -- American pragmatic instrumentalist thought -- a distinct general theory? -- American pragmatic instrumentalist thought -- its influence in America -- The balance sheet and the agenda -- Selected bibliography -- Index

ISBN

080141511X

LCCN

^^^82071596^

Owning Institutions

Harvard Library