Law and Social Theory - LAWS2820
Faculty: Faculty of Law
School: Faculty of Law
Course Outline: See below
Campus: Sydney
Career: Undergraduate
Units of Credit: 6
EFTSL: 0.12500 (more info)
Indicative Contact Hours per Week: 4
Enrolment Requirements:
Pre-requisite: 24 UOC completed in LLB courses or 24 UOC completed in Juris Doctor courses. Juris Doctor students who commenced prior to 2013 need no pre-requisites.
Equivalent: JURD7222, JURD7632, LAWS3332
Excluded: JURD7222, JURD7632, LAWS3332
CSS Contribution Charge: 1 (more info)
Tuition Fee: See Tuition Fee Schedule
Further Information: See Class Timetable
View course information for previous years.
Description
This course is designed to introduce students to theoretical issues concerning the intricate and complex relationships between law and society. It seeks to do this by acquainting them with several important ways of approaching these issues, and with the sorts of questions best (and worst) addressed by each of these approaches.
Course Learning Outcomes
- Demonstrate awareness of principles of theories of law and justice and their relationship to the broader context (knowledge; developing);
- Engage in critical analysis of legal institutions and their connection to specific social and cultural institutions (analytical skills; advanced);
- Engage in critical analysis of the law on one hand and personal and public morality on the other (analytical skills; advanced);
- Produce scholarly writing that demonstrates: (1) acquaintance with legal and social theoretical terminologies and styles; (2) analysis, synthesis, critical judgment, reflection and evaluation; and (3) cites a range of practical and scholarly interdisciplinary research sources (analytical skills; advanced);
- Demonstrate effective oral communication skills by discussing and debating course concepts in a scholarly, reflective and respectful manner (professional skills; advanced);
- Demonstrate self-management through self-assessment of capabilities and performance and use of previous feedback received in the course (professional skills; developing).
Topics
- Introduction to Modernity
- The early Marx on religion and law
- Marx on alienation and historical materialism
- Marx on historical materialism con’t
- Marx and Engels on historical materialism and law
- Marx and Pashukanis on law and commodification
- Durkheim on the concept of society and ‘the social’
- Durkheim’s sociological theory of contract and crime
- Durkheim theory of social and legal evolution
- Durkheim on social and legal pathologies in modernity
- Weber on the dialectic of rationalisation in modernity
- The dialectic of rationalisation con’t
- Weber on the forms of legitimacy
- Weber on legal rationalisation in modernity
- Social theoretical conceptions of the rule of law
- Neo-liberalism, globalisation and the rule of law
- Feminist analyses of the rule of law
- Foucault on discipline, governmentality and the rule of law
Assessment
Class participation - 20% (maximisable)
Texts
Study Levels
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