Law, Virtue and Justice

Amalia Amaya, Hock Lai Ho

• Publisher: Hart Publishing
• Year: 2012
• ISBN:
  9781782250326
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Law
• Subtopic: Jurisprudence
• Index: Law

This book explores the relevance of virtue theory to law from a variety of perspectives. The concept of virtue is central in both contemporary ethics and epistemology. In contrast, in law, there has not been a comparable trend toward explaining normativity on the model of virtue theory. In the last few years, however, there has been an increasing interest in virtue theory among legal scholars. 'Virtue jurisprudence' has emerged as a serious candidate for a theory of law and adjudication. Advocates of virtue jurisprudence put primary emphasis on aretaic concepts rather than on duties or consequences. Aretaic concepts are, on this view, crucial for explaining law and adjudication. This book is a collection of essays examining the role of virtue in general jurisprudence as well as in specific areas of the law. Part I puts together a number of papers discussing various philosophical aspects of an approach to law and adjudication based on the virtues. Part II discusses the relationship between law, virtue and character development, with some of the essays selected analysing this relationship by combining both eastern perspectives on virtue and character with western approaches. Parts III and IV examine problems of substantive areas of law, more specifically, criminal law and evidence law, from within a virtue-based framework. Last, Part V discusses the relevance of empathy to our understanding of justice and legal morality.

Table of contents

• Cover
• Prelims
• Contents
• List of Contributors
• 1. Of Law, Virtue and Justice - An Introduction
• 1. Law, Virtue and Legal Reasoning
• 2. Practical Wisdom in Legal Decision-Making
• 3. The Role of Virtue in Legal Justification
• 4. Education and Paternalism: Plato on Virtue and the Law
• II. Law, Virtue and Character
• 5. Neoclassical Public Virtues: Towards and Aretaic Theory of Law-Making (and Law Teaching)
• 6. Confucian Virtue Jurisprudence
• 7. The Three Stages of Judges' Self-Development
• III. Virtue Theory and Criminal Law
• 8. Motivating Intentions, Reciprocal Specification of Ends and the Assessment of Responsibility
• 9. Liberal Virtue
• 10. Virtue, Vice and the Criminal Law - A Response to Huigens and Yankah
• IV. Legal Fact-Finding: Aretaic Perspectives
• 11. Virtues of Truthfulness in Forbearing Wrongs: Client Confidentiality Qualified by Legal Symmetry of Past and Future Harm
• 12. Virtuous Deliberation on the Criminal Verdict
• 13. Must Virtue be Particular?
• V. Law, Empathy and Justice
• 14. Empathy, Law and Justice
• 15. Empathy in Law (A Response to Slote)
• 16. On Empathy as a Necessary, but Not Sufficient, Foundation for Justice (A Response to Slote)
• 17. Reply to Deigh and Brison
• Index