Berman Nature And Functions Law

A philosophical approach to American system of law.

The essays in this volume appeared in slightly different versions in the Emory Law Journal, volume 42, number 2, pages 433-560. The edited and revised versions of those essays are published with the consent of the editors of the Emory Law Journal to whom grateful acknowledgment is given.

Bentham's law -- The possibility and probability of noncoercive law -- In search of the puzzled man -- Do people obey the law? -- Are officials above the law? -- Coercing obedience -- Of carrots and sticks -- Coercion's arsenal -- Awash in a sea of norms -- The differentiation of law

The book re-orients jurisprudence and develops an empirically informed theory of law that applies throughout history and across different societies.

Berman's long-lost tract shows how properly negotiated, translated and formalised legal language is essential to fostering peace and common understanding.

"The issue of the Protestant ethic and the spirit of capitalism has been debated endlessly, but few scholars have seriously continued Weber's own research into the Reformation sources of seventeenth-century England. David Little's study was one of the first to do so, and remains an important contribution."—Guenther Roth, University of Washington