This book is a great way of summarizing the most important points of books like Hans Kelsen's Pure Theory of law making studying a lot easier and a lot more effective. I recommend this book to any first year law students who can't understand, or don't have the time to read long and difficult books.

This book was my first introduction to the "Very Short Introduction" series of inexpensive paperbacks published by Oxford University Press. The nice thing is that these books measure about 7 X 4.5 inches, so they make the perfect "plane" books, but yet are produced to the strict standards of OUP. I was just amazed at how much solid analysis is contained in the 107 pages of text in this volume, not to mention the "references" section, bibliography, and complete index. The author, who is emeritus at the University of Hong Kong, has essentially boiled down his comprehensive "Understanding Jurisprudence" volume (OUP, 2005, 350 pages) into this concise survey. There are also 15 illustrations and several boxed pages where a particular point is examined in a minute analysis.



The book is divided into 6 chapters. The topics are Natural Law (Hobbes, Locke, Rousseau, Finnis and Fuller); Legal Positivism (Hart, Bentham, Austin, Kelsen, Raz); Law as Interpretation (devoted to Dworkin); Rights and Justice (Hohfeld, Posner, Rawls); Law and Society (Durkheim, Weber, Marx, Habermas, Foucault); and Critical Legal Theory (CLS, Unger, Lacan, Derrida, feminist legal theory, critical race theory). This is a lot to cover in a full-sized volume, but amazingly there is much solid analysis and discussion built into this small paperback. It is the perfect device for those wanting to refresh their familiarity with the jurisprudential field; it also serves as an effective and skillfully-written introduction for those new to the topic. There are many additional interesting titles in this Oxford series that I plan to explore--what a great idea!

This book was my first introduction to the "Very Short Introduction" series of inexpensive paperbacks published by Oxford University Press. The nice thing is that these books measure about 7 X 4.5 inches, so they make the perfect "plane" books, but yet are produced to the strict standards of OUP. I was just amazed at how much solid analysis is contained in the 107 pages of text in this volume, not to mention the "references" section, bibliography, and complete index. The author, who is emeritus at the University of Hong Kong, has essentially boiled down his comprehensive "Understanding Jurisprudence" volume (OUP, 2005, 350 pages) into this concise survey. There are also 15 illustrations and several boxed pages where a particular point is examined in a minute analysis.

The book is divided into 6 chapters. The topics are Natural Law (Hobbes, Locke, Rousseau, Finnis and Fuller); Legal Positivism (Hart, Bentham, Austin, Kelsen, Raz); Law as Interpretation (devoted to Dworkin); Rights and Justice (Hohfeld, Posner, Rawls); Law and Society (Durkheim, Weber, Marx, Habermas, Foucault); and Critical Legal Theory (CLS, Unger, Lacan, Derrida, feminist legal theory, critical race theory). This is a lot to cover in a full-sized volume, but amazingly there is much solid analysis and discussion built into this small paperback. It is the perfect device for those wanting to refresh their familiarity with the jurisprudential field; it also serves as an effective and skillfully-written introduction for those new to the topic. There are many additional interesting titles in this Oxford series that I plan to explore--what a great idea!

This book was my first introduction to the "Very Short Introduction" series of inexpensive paperbacks published by Oxford University Press. The nice thing is that these books measure about 7 X 4.5 inches, so they make the perfect "plane" books, but yet are produced to the strict standards of OUP. I was just amazed at how much solid analysis is contained in the 107 pages of text in this volume, not to mention the "references" section, bibliography, and complete index. The author, who is emeritus at the University of Hong Kong, has essentially boiled down his comprehensive "Understanding Jurisprudence" volume (OUP, 2005, 350 pages) into this concise survey. There are also 15 illustrations and several boxed pages where a particular point is examined in a minute analysis.

The book is divided into 6 chapters. The topics are Natural Law (Hobbes, Locke, Rousseau, Finnis and Fuller); Legal Positivism (Hart, Bentham, Austin, Kelsen, Raz); Law as Interpretation (devoted to Dworkin); Rights and Justice (Hohfeld, Posner, Rawls); Law and Society (Durkheim, Weber, Marx, Habermas, Foucault); and Critical Legal Theory (CLS, Unger, Lacan, Derrida, feminist legal theory, critical race theory). This is a lot to cover in a full-sized volume, but amazingly there is much solid analysis and discussion built into this small paperback. It is the perfect device for those wanting to refresh their familiarity with the jurisprudential field; it also serves as an effective and skillfully-written introduction for those new to the topic. There are many additional interesting titles in this Oxford series that I plan to explore--what a great idea!