This volume consists of outstanding essays by contemporary scholars and specialists on classic writings in law and society. This second edition expands the previous volume by adding additional statements. Included are commentaries on Edward A. Ross's Social Control: A Survey of the Foundations of Order, Karl N. Llewellyn's Jurisprudence: Realism in Theory and Practice, Jerome Frank's Law and the Modern Mind, Leon Petrazycki's Law and Morality, and Karl Renner's The Institutions of Private Law and their Social Functions.The goal of Classic Writings in Law and Society is to acquaint a new generation of students with classic writings by diverse social and legal scholars?ranging from Henry Sumner Maine, Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr., and Hans Kelsen to Eugen Ehrlich, Nicholas S. Timasheff, and Richard Quinney. This work continues to demonstrate their contemporary theoretical relevance. Accordingly, each chapter speaks of the scholars' work in general, how the particular book under consideration fits into that corpus, and how the book is assessed in a present day context. These essays have a clear relation to the "classic" tradition in sociolegal thought.Reading the classics is useful in gaining a better understanding and appreciation of the essential foundation for a post-classic approach in law and social inquiry?an approach that can be found in such orientations as critical legal studies, chaos theory in law, and legal semiotics. Classic Writings in Law and Society includes commentaries that consider early writings that set the standard for the social scientific approach in examining issues of law and punishment, social control, joint stock companies, business firms and nation-states in the study of law and society.

Originally published: New Brunswick, NJ: Transaction Publishers, 2006.

Over against such reference volumes as encyclopedias, which are intended to provide an overview and summary of a subject, and dictionaries, which define a series of terms, "commentaries" generally consist of a collection of lectures or essays that discuss and explain in some detail particular topics and sources. In law, the best known and oldest of these is William Blackstone's Commentaries on the Laws of England (1765-1769). Others, which are equally prominent, include James Kent's Commentaries on American Law (1826) and Joseph Story's Commentaries on the Constitution of the United States (1833). This volume is presented in the spirit of the aforementioned treatises. It consists of several essays of contemporary comments and criticisms intended generally to inform and educate. The commentaries in this book have two collective purposes. First and foremost, they are intended to acquaint a new generation of students with thirteen classic books written by diverse sociolegal scholars--ranging from Henry Sumner Maine, Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr., and Hans Kelsen to Eugen Ehrlich, Nicholas S. Timasheff, and Richard Quinney. Second, they endeavor to demonstrate the contemporary theoretical relevance, the continuing legacy, of these classic writings. Accordingly, the commentaries discuss each of the scholars' work in general, how the particular book under consideration fits into that corpus, and how the book is assessed in a contemporary context. Singly and collectively these books have a clear relation to the "classic" tradition in thought--a tradition that, although not always acknowledged, is of great significance to current theorizing in law and society. The classic tradition represents those books that have come to be considered the foundational texts in the social scientific study of law. The commentaries collected here were written by some of today's leading scholars of law and society, including Piers Beirne, Dario Melossi, Kalus A. Zigert, Alan Hunt, Marshall B. Clinard, and Dragan Milovanovic.

This volume consists of outstanding essays by contemporary scholars and specialists on classic writings in law and society. This second edition expands the previous volume by adding additional statements. Included are commentaries on Edward A. Ross's Social Control: A Survey of the Foundations of Order, Karl N. Llewellyn's Jurisprudence: Realism in Theory and Practice, Jerome Frank's Law and the Modern Mind, Leon Petrazycki's Law and Morality, and Karl Renner's The Institutions of Private Law and their Social Functions. The goal of Classic Writings in Law and Society is to acquaint a new generation of students with classic writings by diverse social and legal scholars�ranging from Henry Sumner Maine, Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr., and Hans Kelsen to Eugen Ehrlich, Nicholas S. Timasheff, and Richard Quinney. This work continues to demonstrate their contemporary theoretical relevance. Accordingly, each chapter speaks of the scholars' work in general, how the particular book under consideration fits into that corpus, and how the book is assessed in a present day context. These essays have a clear relation to the "classic" tradition in sociolegal thought. Reading the classics is useful in gaining a better understanding and appreciation of the essential foundation for a post-classic approach in law and social inquiry�an approach that can be found in such orientations as critical legal studies, chaos theory in law, and legal semiotics. Classic Writings in Law and Society includes commentaries that consider early writings that set the standard for the social scientific approach in examining issues of law and punishment, social control, joint stock companies, business firms and nation-states in the study of law and society.

This collection of socio-legal studies, written by leading theorists and researchers from around the world, offers original, perceptive and critical contributions to ideas and theories that have been expounded by Roger Cotterrell over a long and distinguished career. Engaging with the complexity and multiplicity of our contemporary legal world, the contributions are likely to become classics themselves as they tackle some of the most significant challenges that modern law faces.

For one-semester undergraduate courses in Law and Society, Sociology of Law, Introduction to Law, and a variety of criminal justice courses offered in departments of Sociology, Criminal Justice, and Political Science. Examines the interplay between law and society. Law and Society, 10e provides an informative, balanced and comprehensive analysis of the interplay between law and society. This text presents an overview of the most advanced interdisciplinary and international research, theoretical advances, ongoing debates and controversies. It raises new levels of awareness on the structure and functions of law and legal systems and the principal players in the legal arena and their impact on our lives. In addition, it looks at the legal system in the context of race, class, and gender and considers multicultural and cross-cultural issues in a contemporary and interdisciplinary context.

This textbook on the sociology of law is organised according to the theoretical traditions of sociology, and oriented towards providing an accessible, but sophisticated, introduction to, and overview of, the central themes, problems and debates in this field. The book employs an international range of examples - including the state, minority rights, terrorism, family violence, the legal profession, pornography, mediation, religious tolerance, and euthanasia - in order to distinguish a sociological approach to law from 'black-letter', jurisprudential and empirical policy-oriented traditions. Beginning with 'classical', 'consensus' and 'critical' sociological approaches, the book covers the full range of contemporary perspectives, including the new institutionalism, feminism, the interpretive tradition, postmodernism, legal pluralism and globalisation. It then concludes with a consideration of current theoretical issues, as well as a reflection upon the importance of a sociological approach to law. Understanding Law and Society provides a clear, but critical, discussion of the relevant literature, along with study questions and guides to further reading. It is designed to support courses in law and society and in the sociology of law, but will also be of value to others with interests in these areas.

A core text for the Law and Society or Sociology of Law course offered in Sociology, Criminal Justice, Political Science, and Schools of Law. * John Sutton offers an explicitly analytical perspective to the subject - how does law change? What makes law more or less effective in solving social problems? What do lawyers do? * Chapter 1 contrasts normative and sociological perspectives on law, and presents a brief primer on the logic of research and inference as it is applied to law related issues. * Theories of legal change are discussed within a common conceptual framework that highlights the explantory strengths and weaknesses of different arguments. * Discussions of "law in action" are explicitly comparative, applying a consistent model to explain the variable outcomes of civil rights legislation. * Many concrete, in-depth examples throughout the chapters.

One of the great ironies in contemporary sociology of law is that despite Talcott Parsons’s enormously influential role as “the midwife of modern sociology,” coupled with his three decades of focused and sustained analysis of the legal system’s location in a total and complex society, it is nothing short of appalling that his particular social systems approach to law has been largely neglected. Indeed, although Parsons made only cursory mention of law in some of his best-known works, he extensively discussed the role of the legal system in no less than five important papers and two somewhat lengthy book reviews. What is more, in the two slim paperbacks where Parsons applies his cybernetic systems theory in explaining the progression from premodern to modern societies, he considers law to be an essential element in the analysis of just about every society under consideration: ancient Egypt and the Mesopotamian empires; China, India, and the Islamic empires; the Roman empire; Israel and Greece; medieval Western Christendom; the United States. This volume, the first of its kind, is the most complete articulation of Parsons’s treatment of the U.S. legal system’s nature and function during the late-twentieth century. In addition to a lengthy Introduction by the editor, the book consists of 26 readings, taken from the full range of Parsons’s books and papers, which, in toto, render a detailed analytical roadmap that can today guide much of our sociological thinking concerning such contemporary social issues related to law as citizenship, trust, and governmentality. More than this, Parsons’s writings on the courts and the legal profession—both of which he believed to constitute the core of an integrative U.S. citizenry—can inform policy-makers’ decisions concerning such controversial issues as immigration, civil rights, and legal ethics.