The aim of the unit of study is to provide an understanding of the economic analysis of law and to clarify fundamental differences between legal argument and the analysis of public policy. The unit defines the role of government within the framework of welfare economics and examines the social and economic effects of legal regimes within that framework. Particular attention is given to the concept of a competitive market, to the available empirical evidence on market failure, and to the need for government intervention in response to market failure and its negative consequences for social justice. Topics covered include: theoretical concepts of social justice; social insurance; externalities and the environment; monopoly regulation, tort rights and remedies; asymmetric information, adverse selection and moral hazard with applications to medical malpractice; agency, corporate governance and managerial incentives; family law; taxation; and the measurement of inequality.

This unit of study will introduce the fundamental notions of jurisprudence understood as a theory about the aims, functions and values of law and legal system. It will aim to provide students with the critical understanding of the central issues in philosophy of law understood as a general, abstract, normative reflection on law as such rather than an examination of a concrete legal system. Nevertheless, the purpose will be to provide students with the conceptual means allowing them to conduct a critical scrutiny of particular legal systems and legal rules with which they are familiar. The course will consider, in particular (1) the notions of legitimacy, validity and authority of law; (2) the idea of rights and the nature of the rights discourse; (3) the justifications and limits of liberty rights; (4) the concept of justice, as applied to law, (5) the sources and limits of our obligation to obey the law, etc. The Berlin course will include guest lectures by distinguished German legal scholars on jurisprudential traditions and controversies in Germany

This unit of study aims to provide students with a critical understanding of contemporary philosophical debates about justice. The unit focuses on liberal conceptions of justice and critiques thereof. It examines various moral values in terms of which the law might be assessed. The moral values that it considers include liberty, community, utility, fairness and equality. Among the themes that it explores are the limits of and connections between these ideals, the prospects for their realisation in contemporary societies as well as the politics with which each is associated.

This unit seeks to facilitate critical reflection on prominent responses of both philosophers and sociologists to a single question: what is law? Among the notions to which their answers refer (and on which the unit focuses) are power, class, patriarchy, norms, rules, authority, principles, convention, morality, adjudication and interpretation.

This unit asks whether obedience to legal norms is required by morality. It examines various arguments for a moral obligation to obey the law.

This course examines and evaluates traditional theories of law through the lens of their deployment in the changing context of world society and global governance. It has been supposed that there is no difference in kind between the law internal to a state, and that which exists in the global arena. But the rapid development of norms and institutions used in global governance over the last half century has cast doubt on this assumption. The course surveys leading theories of law and attempt to apply them to the vast and evolving array of international law-related activity. Topics include the nature and role of customary law, enforcement and compliance, transnational authority, 'hard' and 'soft' law, human rights, and international responsibility, among others.

This course will explore the nature and value of the rule of law through a critical examination of classical and contemporary writings in jurisprudence. Among the problems we will consider are: What features of a legal system contribute to bringing about the rule of law? What is 'legality'? What is the relationship between the rule of law and the rule of good law? Is it always a virtue, other things being equal, to apply valid legal rules? How far is the rule of law consistent with the indeterminacy of law or with discretionary decision-making? Is the rule of law an 'unqualified human good'? Why is it good? Should the rule of law ever be sacrificed for the sake of other goods? What does the World Justice Project Rule of Law Index measure? Is it defensible from a jurisprudential point of view, and useful in determining the nature and value of the rule of law? Readings will include historical sources from the ancient Greek and early modern periods, contemporary essays in legal, moral, and political theory, and other primary legal sources.

This unit reflects on the ways in which law, morals and politics are thought of within our tradition and in particular the connections and the tensions between legal positivism, Kantianism and liberalism.

This unit of study introduces elementary approaches to social theory to understand how law and legal institutions regulate or influence communities in various localities or social-scapes: the urban; the local; the national; the state; the international; and the global. Each of these 'worlds' or social configurations present questions for sociological thinkers about the form and technique of laws; the interactions between law and other social institutions; the ideological missions of law; and how law supports or regulates the experience and expectations of justice, freedom, prosperity and peace. Sociological thinkers ask these 'big' questions for lawyers to prompt new thinking about what law does right and what is necessary for it to do better. Students will discover the writings of various 'classical' and 'contemporary' sociological thinkers (including Marx, Durkheim, Weber, Foucault, Bourdieu, Beck, Bauman and Sassen) in the contexts presented by various social-scapes or 'worlds'. The course will use various examples to encourage students to understand the relevance of social theory to them as lawyers. The unit does not presuppose prior knowledge of social theory. This unit satisfies the Part 2 (Jurisprudence) requirement of the LLB.

This course examines and evaluates theories of law through the perspective of the criminal law. It has been supposed that criminal law may be understood as an application of certain tenets of liberal moral and political philosophy. But the rapid development of criminal laws in Australia and elsewhere over the last 50 years and the co-evolution and fragmentation of notions of personhood, citizenship, and community challenges this assumption. The course surveys leading theories of criminal law and attempts to use them to critically assess the evolving mix of criminal law doctrines, practices and procedures in place in legal systems such as those of Australia. Topics include the nature of criminal responsibility, the moral limits of the criminal law, objects of criminalisation and legal subjectivity. This unit satisfies the Part 2 (Jurisprudence) requirement of the LLB.

This unit examines the largely diffuse concepts of social control and the functions of law and proposes a more specific approach to legal theory which incorporates the latest findings of socio-legal research on the social effects of law. As a result of this discussion, a more specific concept of social control and an explanatory assessment of the social effects of law, including its political use, are presented with their theoretical implications for legal and political systems and applied, as examples, to historically and societally varied situations.

The judge has long been an important legal actor in common law countries, but over the past several decades, there has been a rise in judicial power globally, with the proliferation of constitutional courts and the strengthening of judiciaries in countries around the world. This seminar will consider views in jurisprudence which examines the judge, the activity of judging, and the proper role of the judiciary within a legal system and a just society more generally. Among the goals of the seminar are to determine the nature of judicial obligation, how judges ought to decide cases, the arguments for and against judicial review, the role of the judiciary in establishing and maintaining the rule of law, and the relation between the business of courts, politics, and morality.

The common law is an essential part of the Australian legal system, as well as many others around the world. This unit of study examines the nature of the common law from the point of view of jurisprudence. We will begin with a survey of the classic Common Law Theories developed in England during the seventeenth century; from there, a variety of problems surrounding the common law which these theories made salient, and which still puzzle us today, will be examined. Topics include: the nature and authority of precedent, the distinctiveness of legal reasoning, the nature and questions surrounding the validity of customary law, the relation between the common law and the ideal of the rule of law, among others.

Many legal doctrines in both criminal and civil law depend upon being able to characterise conduct as intentional, leading to ascriptions of fault, blame or responsibility. Most serious criminal offences depend upon establishing mens rea as a relevant mental element. Civil liability is often dependent upon whether conduct was intended, or whether the cause of loss was brought about by either intentional conduct or conduct involving some lesser notion of fault. All of these doctrines make important assumptions about the nature of our mental states and the operation of mind. Many of these assumptions are philosophically controversial and current developments in the philosophy of mind may lead us to reconsider or radically revise our attitudes to the law. The unit will look at contemporary philosophical work on free will consciousness, mind, and causation and apply this work to present problems in regard to concepts of legal responsibility.

The unit will seek to analyse the central concepts of some of the main areas of civil law, including tort, contract and property from the perspective of a number of contemporary moral theories. The unit will examine the work of moral philosophers in the fields of distributive and corrective justice such as John Rawls, Jules Coleman and Ernest Weinrib. The unit will also consider theories associated with the economic analysis movement in legal philosophy, especially the theories of Richard Posner. The unit will apply moral theories on the one hand, and rational action theories such as the economic analysis view of law on the other, to better understand legal doctrine. In addition to property, contract and civil wrongs, the unit will look at constitutional structures and international law. While considering a wide variety of legal doctrines, the focus of the unit will always be on the way these doctrines are better understood from the perspective of theories of justice or versions of rational action theory.