Legal positivism is a school of thought of philosophy of law and jurisprudence, largely developed by nineteenth-century legal thinkers such as Jeremy Bentham and John Austin. However, the most prominent figure in the history of legal positivism is H.L.A. Hart, whose work The Concept of Law caused a fundamental re-thinking of the positivist doctrine and its relationship with the other principal theories of law. In more recent years the central claims of legal positivism have come under significant attack from Ronald Dworkin.

It is difficult to summarize positivist thinking, but it is generally accepted that the central claim of legal positivism is the following:

"In any legal system, whether a given norm is legally valid, and hence whether it forms part of the law of that system, depends on its sources, not its merits."^[1]

Legal validity and the sources of law[link]

Legal positivists make some distinctive claims about what constitutes legal validity. It is difficult to improve on the following introduction offered by Leslie Green: "Whether a society has a legal system depends on the presence of certain structures of governance, not on the extent to which it satisfies ideals of justice, democracy, or the rule of law. What laws are in force in that system depends on what social standards its officials recognize as authoritative; for example, legislative enactments, judicial decisions, or social customs. The fact that a policy would be just, wise, efficient, or prudent is never sufficient reason for thinking that it is actually the law, and the fact that it is unjust, unwise, inefficient or imprudent is never sufficient reason for doubting it. According to positivism, law is a matter of what has been posited (ordered, decided, practiced, tolerated, etc.); as we might say in a more modern idiom, positivism is the view that law is a social construction."^[2]

Legal positivism was focusing on how to prevent possible conflict between concurrent rule(s) and successive norm(s), or foundation of law(s) in reality so that it tends to equate the authority to compose a law(s) to the authority to abolish a law(s). Why the tendency is critical is for that the claim simultaneously opens the possibility to directly access to the constitution by those who have not direct legal interest so that the possible vain claim could be readily abused by some political movement(s) which is not regarded as normal work(s) of any law system. However, it is also true that legal positivism contributes to improve the way of legal reasoning in term of more nomothetic (rule-making) approach to a case in turn. To the point, legal positivism and legal realism are similar to each other except to recognizing the source(s) of law and jurisprudence. The reason why legal positivism is popular to are largely depending on its assimilation to the modern normal science and its acceptance of social class theory else.^{[citation needed]}

The implications of being a legal positivist:

Despite the central claim of legal positivism that legal validity depends on sources, legal positivism does not claim that the laws so identified should be followed or obeyed or that there is value in having clear, identifiable rules (although some positivists may also make these claims). Indeed, the laws of a legal system may be quite unjust, and the state may be quite illegitimate. As a result there may be no obligation to obey them. Moreover, the fact that a law has been identified by a court as valid provides no guidance as to whether the court should apply it in a particular case. As John Gardner has said, legal positivism is 'normatively inert'; it is a theory of law, not a theory of legal practice, adjudication, or political obligation. Legal positivists believe that intellectual clarity is best achieved by leaving these questions to a separate investigation.

Legal positivism and legal realism[link]

Legal positivism should be distinguished from legal realism and such legal realists as Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr. The differences are both analytically and normatively important. Both systems consider that law is a human construct. Unlike the American realists, positivists believe that in many instances the law provides reasonably determinate guidance to its subjects and to judges, at least in trial courts.

Niklas Luhmann asserts "We can reduce... positive law to a formula, that law is not only posited (that is, selected) through decision, but also is valid by the power of decision (thus contingent and changeable)."^[3] However, no positivist has ever asserted that law is made valid by anyone's decision. In Hart's opinion, the validity of law is a matter of the customary and collective practices of the courts. As for as the moral validity of law, both positivists and realists maintain that this is a matter of moral principles. 'The power of decision' has no essential role in either, since individual decision rarely suffices to create a social practice of recognition, and it would be implausible to suppose that moral principles are made so by anyone's decision.

History[link]

Jeremy Bentham[link]

Jeremy Bentham

In English-language philosophy, legal positivism begins with the work of Jeremy Bentham, the utilitarian philosopher. Bentham made a sharp distinction between people he called:

• Expositors - those who explained what the law in practice was; and
• Censors - those who criticised the law in practice and compared it to their notions of what it ought to be.

The philosophy of law, considered strictly, was to explain the real laws of the expositors, rather than the criticisms of the censors.

Bentham was also noted for calling natural law "nonsense upon stilts."

John Austin[link]

The distinguishing feature of a legal system is the existence of a sovereign whose authority is recognized by most members of a society, the authority of which is enforced by the use of sanctions, but which is not bound by any human superior. The criterion for validity of a legal rule in such a society is that it has the warrant of the sovereign and will be enforced by the sovereign power and its agents.

The three basic tenets of Austin's positivism are:

• laws are commands issued by the uncommanded commander, i.e. the sovereign;
• such commands are enforced by sanctions; and
• a sovereign is one who is obeyed by the majority.

Austin considered the law as commands from a sovereign that are enforced by threat of sanction. In determining 'a sovereign', Austin recognized it is one whom society obeys habitually. This sovereign can be a single person or a collective sovereign such as Parliament, with a number of individuals, with each having various authoritative powers. Austin's theory is also somewhat brief in his explanations of Constitutions, International Law, non-sanctioned rules, or law that gives rights. Insofar as non-sanctioned rules and laws that allow persons to do things, such as contract law, Austin said that failure to obey the rules does result in sanctions; however, such sanctions are in the form of "the sanction of nullity."

Austin was greatly influenced in his philosophy by Jeremy Bentham.

Hans Kelsen[link]

Kelsen's is considered a very strict and scientifically understood type of legal positivism. It is based on the idea of a Grundnorm, a hypothetical norm on which all subsequent levels of a legal system such as constitutional law and "simple" law are based. For Kelsen, "sovereignty" was a loaded concept: "We can derive from the concept of sovereignty nothing else other than what we have purposely put into its definition."

His theory has disciples among scholars of public law worldwide. His disciples developed "schools" of thought to extend his theories, such as the Vienna School in Austria and the Brno School in Czechoslovakia. In English-speaking countries, H. L. A. Hart and Joseph Raz are perhaps the most well-known authors who were influenced by Kelsen, though both differed from Kelsen's theories in several respects.

H.L.A. Hart[link]

H. L. A. Hart later addressed Austin. Hart liked Austin's theory of a sovereign, but claimed that Austin's Command Theory failed in several important respects. In the book The Concept of Law, Hart outlined several key points: Among the many ideas developed in this book are:

• A critique of John Austin's theory that law is the command of the sovereign enforced by the threat of punishment.
• A distinction between the internal and external considerations of law and rules, close to (and influenced by) Max Weber's distinction between the sociological and the legal perspectives of law.
• A distinction between primary and secondary legal rules, such that a primary rule governs conduct, such as criminal law and a secondary rules govern the procedural methods by which primary rules are enforced, prosecuted and so on. Hart specifically enumerates three secondary rules; they are:

• The Rule of Recognition, the rule by which any member of society may check to discover what the primary rules of the society are. In a simple society, Hart states, the recognition rule might only be what is written in a sacred book or what is said by a ruler. Hart claimed the concept of rule of recognition as an evolution from Hans Kelsen's "Grundnorm", or "basic norm."
• The Rule of Change, the rule by which existing primary rules might be created, altered or deleted.
• The Rule of Adjudication, the rule by which the society might determine when a rule has been violated and prescribe a remedy.

• A late reply (1994 Edition) to Ronald Dworkin, who criticized legal positivism in general and especially Hart's account of law in Taking Rights Seriously (1977), A Matter of Principle (1985) and Law's Empire (1986).

Joseph Raz[link]

A pupil of H. L. A. Hart, Raz has been important in continuing Hart's arguments of legal positivism since Hart's death. This included editing a second edition of Hart's 'The Concept of Law', with an additional section including Hart's responses to other philosophers' criticisms of his work.

Raz has also argued, contrary to Hart,^[4] that the validity of a law can never depend on its morality.^[5]

See also[link]

References[link]

Further reading[link]

• Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy entry by Kenneth Einar Himma
• Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy entry by Leslie Green
• Daniel Z. Epstein (2007). SSRN.com, Law's 'I'

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Robert Alexy.

Robert Alexy (born September 9, 1945 in Oldenburg, Germany) is a jurist and a legal philosopher.

Alexy studied law and philosophy at the University of Göttingen. He received his PhD in 1976 with the dissertation A Theory of Legal Argumentation, and he achieved his Habilitation in 1984 with a Theory of Constitutional Rights).

He is a professor at the University of Kiel^[1] and in 2002 he was appointed to the Academy of Sciences and Humanities at the University of Göttingen.^[2] In 2010 he was awarded the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany.^[3]

Alexy's definition of law looks like a mix of Kelsen's normativism (which was an influential version of legal positivism) and Radbruch's legal naturalism (Alexy, 2002), but Alexy's theory of argumentation (Alexy, 1983) puts him very close to legal interpretivism.

Publications[link]

• Theorie der juristischen Argumentation. Die Theorie des rationalen Diskurses als Theorie der juristischen Begründung (1983, first edition 1978).
  • Translated by Neil MacCormick as "A Theory of Legal Argumentation: The Theory of Rational Discourse as Theory of Legal Justification" (Clarendon, 1989).
• Theorie der Grundrechte (1985; second edition 1994).
  • Translated by Julian Rivers as "A Theory of Constitutional Rights" (Oxford University Press, 2002).
• Mauerschützen (1993)
• Recht, Vernunft, Diskurs (1995)
• Der Beschluß des Bundesverfassungsgerichts zu den Tötungen an der innerdeutschen Grenze vom 24. Oktober 1996 (1999)
• Begriff und Geltung des Rechts (2002)
• The Argument from Injustice: A Reply to Legal Positivism. Translated by Stanley Paulson and Bonnie Litschewski Paulson (Oxford University Press, 2002).
• Elemente einer juristischen Begründungslehre (2003)

References[link]

Ronald Myles Dworkin

Ronald Dworkin at the Brooklyn Book Festival.
Born	(1931-12-11) December 11, 1931 (age 80) Providence, Rhode Island
Era	20th/21st-century philosophy
Region	Western Philosophy
School	Jurisprudence, Political philosophy
Notable ideas	law as integrity, fit and justification in law, right answer thesis, legal interpretivism, rights as trumps
Influenced by Cross · Hand · Hart · Rawls
Influenced Alexy · Dyzenhaus · Kumm · Kymlicka · Leiter · Stavropoulos · Waldron

Ronald Myles Dworkin, FBA (born December 11, 1931) is an American philosopher and scholar of constitutional law. He is Frank Henry Sommer Professor of Law and Philosophy at New York University and Emeritus Professor of Jurisprudence at University College London, and has taught previously at Yale Law School and the University of Oxford. An influential contributor to both philosophy of law and political philosophy, Dworkin received the 2007 Holberg International Memorial Prize in the Humanities for "his pioneering scholarly work" of "worldwide impact."^[1] According to a survey in The Journal of Legal Studies, Dworkin was the second most-cited American legal scholar of the twentieth century.^[2]

His theory of law as integrity, in which judges interpret the law in terms of consistent and communal moral principles, especially justice and fairness, is amongst the most influential contemporary theories about the nature of law. He advocates a "moral reading" of the United States Constitution,^[3] and an interpretivist approach to law and morality. He is a frequent commentator on contemporary political and legal issues, particularly those concerning the Supreme Court of the United States, often in the pages of The New York Review of Books.

Biography[link]

Ronald Dworkin was born in 1931 in Providence, Rhode Island, United States. He studied at Harvard University and at Magdalen College, Oxford, where he was a Rhodes Scholar and a student of Sir Rupert Cross. After completing his final year's exams at Oxford, the examiners were so impressed with his script that the Chair of Jurisprudence (then H. L. A. Hart) was summoned to read it. Dworkin then attended Harvard Law School and subsequently clerked for Judge Learned Hand of the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit. Judge Hand would later call Dworkin the finest clerk he ever employed, and Dworkin would recall Judge Hand as an enormously influential mentor. After working at Sullivan & Cromwell, a prominent law firm in New York City, Dworkin became a Professor of Law at Yale University, where he became the holder of the Wesley N. Hohfeld Chair of Jurisprudence.

In 1969, Dworkin was appointed to the Chair of Jurisprudence at Oxford, a position in which he succeeded H. L. A. Hart, and elected Fellow of University College, Oxford. After retiring from Oxford, Dworkin became the Quain Professor of Jurisprudence at University College London, where he subsequently became the Bentham Professor of Jurisprudence—a position he does not hold anymore (he gave his valedictory lecture at UCL in March 2008). He is also currently Frank Henry Sommer Professor of Law at New York University School of Law and professor of Philosophy at New York University (NYU),^[4] where he has taught since the late 1970s. He currently co-teaches a colloquium in legal, political, and social philosophy with Thomas Nagel. Dworkin has regularly contributed, for several decades, to The New York Review of Books. He delivered the Oliver Wendell Holmes Lecture at Harvard, the Storrs Lectures at Yale, the Tanner Lectures on Human Values at Stanford, and the Scribner Lectures at Princeton. In June 2011 it was announced that he would join the professoriate of New College of the Humanities, a private college in London.^[5]

Law as rule and principle[link]

Positivism's most significant critic rejects the theory on every conceivable level. He denies that there can be any general theory of the existence and content of law; he denies that local theories of particular legal systems can identify law without recourse to its merits, and he rejects the whole institutional focus of positivism. A theory of law is for Dworkin a theory of how cases ought to be decided and it begins, not with an account of political organization, but with an abstract ideal regulating the conditions under which governments may use coercive force over their subjects.^[6]

Dworkin is most famous for his critique of Hart's legal positivism; he sets forth the fullest statement of his critique in his book Law's Empire. Dworkin's theory is 'interpretive': the law is whatever follows from a constructive interpretation of the institutional history of the legal system.

Dworkin argues that moral principles that people hold dear are often wrong, even to the extent that certain crimes are acceptable if one's principles are skewed enough. To discover and apply these principles, courts interpret the legal data (legislation, cases etc.) with a view to articulating an interpretation that best explains and justifies past legal practice. All interpretation must follow, Dworkin argues, from the notion of "law as integrity" to make sense.

Out of the idea that law is 'interpretive' in this way, Dworkin argues that in every situation where people's legal rights are controversial, the best interpretation involves the right answer thesis. Dworkin opposes the notion that judges have a discretion in such difficult cases.

Dworkin's model of legal principles is also connected with Hart's notion of the Rule of Recognition. Dworkin rejects Hart's conception of a master rule in every legal system that identifies valid laws, on the basis that this would entail that the process of identifying law must be uncontroversial, whereas (Dworkin argues) people have legal rights even in cases where the correct legal outcome is open to reasonable dispute.

While Dworkin moves away from positivism's separation of law and morality, his concept suggests that the two are related in an epistemic rather than ontological sense as posited by traditional natural law.

The right answer thesis[link]

Suppose the legislature has passed a statute stipulating that 'sacrilegious contracts shall henceforth be invalid.' The community is divided as to whether a contract signed on Sunday is, for that reason alone, sacrilegious. It is known that very few of the legislators had that question in mind when they voted, and that they are now equally divided on the question of whether it should be so interpreted. Tom and Tim have signed a contract on Sunday, and Tom now sues Tim to enforce the terms of the contract, whose validity Tim contests. Shall we say that the judge must look for the right answer to the question of whether Tom's contract is valid, even though the community is deeply divided about what the right answer is? Or is it more realistic to say that there simply is no right answer to the question? (Dworkin, 1985, p. 119)

One of Dworkin's most interesting and controversial theses states that the law as properly interpreted will give an answer. This is not to say that everyone will have the same answer (a consensus of what is "right"), or if it did, the answer would not be justified exactly in the same way for every person; rather it means that there will be a necessary answer for each individual if he applies himself correctly to the legal question. For the correct method is that encapsulated by the metaphor of Hercules J. This metaphor of Judge Hercules, an ideal judge, immensely wise and with full knowledge of legal sources. Hercules (the name comes from a classical mythological hero) would also have plenty of time to decide. Acting on the premise that the law is a seamless web, Hercules is required to construct the theory that best fits and justifies the law as a whole (law as integrity) in order to decide any particular case. Hercules, Dworkin argues, would always come to the one right answer.

Dworkin does not deny that competent lawyers often disagree on what is the solution to a given case. On the contrary, he claims that they are disagreeing about the right answer to the case, the answer Hercules would give.

Dworkin's critics argue not only that law proper (that is, the legal sources in a positivist sense) is full of gaps and inconsistencies, but also that other legal standards (including principles) may be insufficient to solve a hard case. Some of them are incommensurable. In any of these situations, even Hercules would be in a dilemma and none of the possible answers would be the right one.

Discussion of the right answer thesis[link]

Dworkin defends his position saying that non-Herculean judges, much like everyday people, find their way and choose between options and values that were supposed to be incommensurable. Dworkin also argues that it is always possible to find out other rules or principles to solve the conflict between those we had in mind. The same counter-argument, however, regarding principles and moral standards that are incommensurable, would seem to apply to any further principles or rules we may discover in the process. In other words, the claim that there may always be more principles or rules to be taken into account proves nothing about the nature of those further principles, or about Dworkin's claim that the exercise, in the hands of the omnipotent Judge Hercules, will eventually come to a stop (when we have reached the right answer). In fact, the opposite conclusion could just as well be drawn from Dworkin's claim - that the exercise in question, under the guidance of such an omnipotent figure, would extend into infinity. Thus while a 'right' answer may be available at any given stage, no final right answer would ever be arrived at by Hercules. Or, there is nothing to suggest one way or the other.

Dworkin's metaphor of judge Hercules bears some resemblance to Rawls' veil of ignorance and Habermas' ideal speech situation, in that they all suggest idealized methods of arriving at somehow valid normative propositions. The key difference with respect to the former is that Rawls' veil of ignorance translates almost seamlessly from the purely ideal to the practical. In relation to politics in a democratic society, for example, it is a way of saying that those in power should treat the political opposition consistently with how they would like to be treated when in opposition, because their present position offers no guarantee as to what their position will be in the political landscape of the future (i.e. they will inevitably form the opposition at some point). Dworkin's Judge Hercules, on the other hand, is a purely idealized construct, that is if such a figure existed, he would arrive at a right answer in every moral dilemma. For a critique along these lines see Lorenzo Zucca's Constitutional Dilemmas.^[7]

Dworkin's right answer thesis turns on the success of his attack on the sceptical argument that right answers in legal-moral dilemmas cannot be determined. Dworkin's anti-sceptical argument is essentially that the properties of the sceptic's claim are analogous to those of substantive moral claims, that is, in asserting that the truth or falsity of 'legal-moral' dilemmas cannot be determined, the sceptic makes not a metaphysical claim about the way things are, but a moral claim to the effect that it is, in the face of epistemic uncertainty, unjust to determine legal-moral issues to the detriment of any given individual.

Theory of equality[link]

Dworkin has also made important contributions to what is sometimes called the equality of what debate. In a famous pair of articles and his book Sovereign Virtue he advocates a theory he calls 'equality of resources'. This theory combines two key ideas. Broadly speaking, the first is that human beings are responsible for the life choices they make. The second is that natural endowments of intelligence and talent are morally arbitrary and ought not to affect the distribution of resources in society. Like the rest of Dworkin's work, his theory of equality is underpinned by the core principle that every person is entitled to equal concern and respect in the design of the structure of society. Dworkin's theory of equality is one variety of so-called luck egalitarianism.

Positive and negative liberty[link]

This section may contain original research. Please improve it by verifying the claims made and adding references. Statements consisting only of original research may be removed. More details may be available on the talk page. (January 2011)

In the essay "Do Values Conflict? A Hedgehog's Approach" (Arizona Law Review, Vol 43:2), Dworkin contends that the values of liberty and equality do not necessarily conflict. He criticizes Isaiah Berlin's conception of liberty as "flat" and proposes a new, "dynamic" conception of liberty, suggesting that one cannot say that one's liberty is infringed when one is prevented from committing murder. Thus, liberty cannot be said to have been infringed when no wrong has been done. Put in this way, liberty is only liberty to do whatever we wish so long as we do not infringe upon the rights of others.

The negative conception of liberty (represented by Isaiah Berlin) is however not satisfactory to Dworkin since it merely concerns itself with political processes (e.g. laws forbidding murder, limiting car usage etc.). In Dworkin's view liberty must be understood as entailing certain considerations of equality, since it is not possible to exercise one's freedom without a considerable amount of resources (e.g. participating in the democratic process by voting is not possible without having the food, health, time or knowledge to do so). Liberty is therefore not only a question of process, but must also contain elements of substance.

One further criticism that can be leveled from the Berlinian enterprise is that the so-called "flat" conception of liberty does not entail the liberty to murder - rather, murder (when it does occur) is only a consequence of natural liberty. When one is prevented from murdering, one's liberty is not infringed merely because one is prevented from murdering, but because (more fundamentally) one is prevented from acting at all, by being restrained, handcuffed, put into prison, etc. The fact that one is thereby prevented from murdering is, again, merely a consequence of one's liberty being infringed. Thus Dworkin's argument can be recast as a deep-level consequentialist one.

Participant in public debate[link]

Dworkin is noted for his avid participation in public debates over law and issues of fundamental rights. He has been a frequent contributor to The New York Review of Books.

Awards[link]

In September 2007, it was announced that Dworkin was to be awarded the Holberg International Memorial Prize. The prize, at approximately US$450,000, is awarded by the University of Bergen in Norway. The award citation of the Holberg Prize Academic Committee recognized that Dworkin has "elaborated a liberal egalitarian theory" and stressed Dworkin's effort to develop "an original and highly influential legal theory grounding law in morality, characterized by a unique ability to tie together abstract philosophical ideas and arguments with concrete everyday concerns in law, morals, and politics".^[8]

The New York University Annual Survey of American Law honored Dworkin with its 2006 dedication. Each spring dating back to 1942 the NYU Annual Survey of American Law dedicates one of its volumes to a preeminent figure in American law. Contemporaries Thomas Nagel, Richard Posner, and Jeremy Waldron all presented in honor of Dworkin.

In August 2011, the University of Buenos Aires awarded Dworkin an honorary doctorate. The resolution noted that he "has tirelessly defended the rule of law, democracy and human rights."

Bibliography[link]

Books by Ronald Dworkin[link]

• Taking Rights Seriously. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1977.
• The Philosophy of Law (Oxford Readings in Philosophy). Ed. New York: Oxford University Press, 1977.
• A Matter of Principle. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1985.
• Law's Empire. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1986.
• Philosophical Issues in Senile Dementia. Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1987.
• A Bill of Rights for Britain. Ann Arbor, MI: University of Michigan Press, 1990.
• Life's Dominion: An Argument About Abortion, Euthanasia, and Individual Freedom. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1993.
• Freedom's Law: The Moral Reading of the American Constitution. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1996.
• Sovereign Virtue: The Theory and Practice of Equality. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2000.
• A Badly Flawed Election: Debating Bush v. Gore, the Supreme Court, and American Democracy. Ed. New York: New Press, 2002.
• From Liberal Values to Democratic Transition: Essays in Honor of Janos Kis. Ed. Budapest: Central European University Press, 2004.
• Justice in Robes. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2006.
• Is Democracy Possible Here? Principles for a New Political Debate. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2006.
• The Supreme Court Phalanx: The Court's New Right-Wing Bloc. New York: New York Review Books, 2008.
• Justice for Hedgehogs. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2011.

Secondary literature on Dworkin[link]

• Allard, Julie. Dworkin et Kant: Réflexions sur le judgement. Bruxelles: Editions de l'ULB, 2001.
• Brown, Alexander. Ronald Dworkin's Theory of Equality: Domestic and Global Perspectives. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2009.
• Burke, John J.A. The Political Foundation of Law: The Need for Theory with Practical Value. San Francisco: Austin & Winfield, 1992.
• Burley, Justine, ed. Dworkin and His Critics. Oxford: Blackwell Publishing, 2004.
• Cohen, Marshall, ed. Ronald Dworkin and Contemporary Jurisprudence. London: Duckworth, 1984.
• Gaffney, Paul. Ronald Dworkin on Law as Integrity: Rights as Principles of Adjudication. Lewiston, New York: Mellen University Press, 1996.
• Guest, Stephen. Ronald Dworkin (Jurists: Profiles in Legal Theory). Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1991.
• Hershovitz, Scott, ed. Exploring Law's Empire: The Jurisprudence of Ronald Dworkin. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2006.
• Hunt, Alan, ed. Reading Dworkin Critically. New York: Berg, 1992.
• Ripstein, Arthur, ed. Ronald Dworkin (Contemporary Philosophers in Focus). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007.
• Wesche, Stefen and Zanetti, Véronique, eds. Dworkin: Un débat. Paris: Ousia, 2000.

See also[link]

• American philosophy
• Contributions to liberal theory
• Egalitarianism
• Legal indeterminacy
• Judicial activism
• Legal formalism
• Legal positivism
• List of American philosophers
• Equality

References[link]

External links[link]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Ronald Dworkin

Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to: Ronald Dworkin

• NYU Law Faculty profile
• UCL Faculty of Laws profile
• New York Review of Books archive
• "Ronald Dworkin - Mr Justice", The Times Literary Supplement, 5 December 2007
• "Interpretation and Coherence in Legal Reasoning" at the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy
• "Interpretivist Theories of Law" at the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy
• Charles Blattberg's critique of Dworkin and John Rawls for failing to take politics seriously enough.
• Ronald Dworkin at the Internet Movie Database