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My Philosophy of Law

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The Law in Philosophical Perspectives

Part of the book series: Law and Philosophy Library ((LAPS,volume 41))

Abstract

I believe in law. That is, I believe that there is a distinct sphere of human experience which we can construct as a specific domain of understanding and activity, to which the name “law” is appropriate and hallowed by usage. I further believe in law in the stronger sense that I think human life, the life of human beings in social relations with each other, is enhanced by having for its framework (or a part of its framework) some body or bodies of law that stabilise our mutual expectations. Simply: there is such a thing as law, and where it exists it tends to improve the lives of those who live by it. Law exists, and law has prima facie positive value.

This paper is a substantially re-worked version of a paper which first took shape as my Otto Brusiin Lecture “Law as Institutional Normative Order” presented before the Finnish Academy of Science and Letters in September 1994; and which secondly became a paper “Institutional Normative Order: A Conception of Law” presented to a symposium in Cornell Law School on March 1-2 1997, which paper now awaits publication in Cornell Law Review. The opening and closing sections are entirely new, and there have been some revisions of other parts since the Cornell version.

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Edinburgh, UK

    Neil MacCormick

Authors
  1. Neil MacCormick
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Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. European Academy of Legal Theory and the Centre of Legal Theory, University of Brussels, Belgium

    Luc J. Wintgens

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© 1999 Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht

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MacCormick, N. (1999). My Philosophy of Law. In: Wintgens, L.J. (eds) The Law in Philosophical Perspectives. Law and Philosophy Library, vol 41. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-015-9317-5_5

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-015-9317-5_5

  • Publisher Name: Springer, Dordrecht

  • Print ISBN: 978-90-481-5256-8

  • Online ISBN: 978-94-015-9317-5

  • eBook Packages: Springer Book Archive

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