Oxford LibGuides: Jurisprudence: Critical Legal Theory

Modernism & Critical (Legal) Theory/Thinking/Studies, Critical Race Theory (CRT)

"A family of new legal theories, launched since 1970, share commitments to criticize not merely particular legal rules or outcomes, but larger structures of conventional legal thought and practice. According to critical legal scholars, dominant legal doctrines and conceptions perpetuate patterns of injustice and dominance by whites, men, the wealthy, employers, and heterosexuals. The "Crits" argue that prevailing modes of legal reasoning pretend to afford neutral and objective treatment of claims while shielding structures of power from fundamental reconsideration. Critical theorists also maintain that despite the law's claims to accord justified, determinate and controlled expressions of power, law fails on each of these dimensions and instead law mystifies outsiders in an effort to legitimate the results in courts and legislatures. " Overview of Critical Legal Theory on The Bridge (see link below)

Originating in the US civil rights movement of the 1970s, CRT has since developed sub-categories, crossed jurisdictional borders, and into aspects of public international law. For example Asian American Legal Scholarship, LatCrit (Latin American), and Critical Indigenous Legal Theory.

Specific subject searches to use in SOLO include:

Critical Legal Studies
Sociological jurisprudence

Introduction to Critical Legal Theory by Ian Ward
Call Number: Holders of an Oxford SSO can read this online via title link.
ISBN: 1859419283
Publication Date: 2nd edn 2004
Print copy is at Jurisp 510 W258d2
Law's Environment: Critical Legal Perspectives by Ubaldus De Vries (Editor); Lyana Francot (Editor)
Call Number: Holders of an Oxford SSO can read this online via title link
ISBN: 9789490947224
Publication Date: 2011
Critical Theory in Critical Times by Penelope Deutscher (Editor); Cristina Lafont (Editor)
Call Number: Holders of an Oxford SSO can read this online via title link
ISBN: 023154362X
Publication Date: 2017

Useful articles may appear in non-legal journals. Some examples are:

Critical Sociology
Remote access requires Oxford SSO
Qualitative inquiry (QI)
Remote access requires Oxford SSO.
International journal of qualitative studies in education: QSE
Remote access requires Oxford SSO.

Useful material on the free web include

Critical Legal Theory (The Bridge, Harvard)
Open Access. Materials on various aspects of legal philosophy & theory "developed by seven members of the Harvard law faculty (the late Abram Chayes, William Fisher, Morton Horwitz, Frank Michelman, Martha Minow, Charles Nesson, and Todd Rakoff)".
Critical Legal Thinking: Law and the political
"The aim of Critical Legal Thinking (CLT) is to provide a platform for critical legal scholars and allied thinkers to publish theoretically informed comment and analysis on current events.
Instead of a managing editor and board, we comprise several facilitators who stay in the background. We share the conviction that (legal) critique is the companion and guide of radical change."
Critical Race Theory (USA)
Open Access. Article by Chris Demaske in The First Amendment Encyclopedia, since October 2016, Middle Tennessee State University, on behalf of the John Seigenthaler Chair of Excellence in First Amendment Studies, purchased the exclusive license to publish and display the work on a new website developed at MTSU.
Critical Legal Studies Movement
Open Access. Section of Harvard University The Bridge website.
Race in Moral, Political and Legal Philosophy
Open access Section 4 of James, Michael, "Race", The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Spring 2017 Edition), Edward N. Zalta (ed.), URL = .
LatCrit: Primers
LatCrit has had "basic twin goals since 1995 .. (1) to develop a critical, activist and inter-disciplinary discourse on law and policy towards Latinas/os, and (2) to foster both the development of coalitional theory and practice as well as the accessibility of this knowledge to agents of social and legal transformation. " Open Access downloads include first 3 volumes of LatCrit Primers
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The second Volume of LatCrit scholarship was compiled specifically for the purpose of introducing LatCrit conference participants to the evolving body of LatCrit theory and discourse. This second volume of the Primer was assembled in preparation for the LatCrit VI conference and reflects the editorial selections of Elizabeth Iglesias, Kevin Johnson and Frank Valdes, as well as the logistical support of Pedro Malavet at the University of Florida College of Law and of the support staff of the University of Miami Center for Hispanic and Caribbean Legal Studies. Neither Volume purports to define the parameters of LatCrit theory or discourse, but rather seeks only to reflect some of the major currents that were evolving in LatCrit scholarship during the first five years of the LatCrit project. The second Volume includes articles from the LatCrit symposia in journals including: the University of Miami Law Review Symposium, which published the articles and essays of the LatCrit III Conference in Miami Beach; the University of California at Davis Law Review Symposium, which published the articles and essays of the LatCrit IV Conference in California, as well as the Michigan Journal of Law Reform/Michigan Journal of Race and the Law which produced the second standalone volume of LatCrit scholarship – a symposium, which focused specifically on introducing interdisciplinary
scholarship and centering questions of culture, nation and power in LatCrit discourse.

The third Volume of the LatCrit Primer provided a historical overview of the development of LatCrit legal theory by publishing the Forewords and Afterwords of the various LatCrit Symposia. This volume reflects the growth of the LatCrit theory through the participation of an expanding number of international and interdisciplinary scholars. This Primer also provides a glimpse of content of each symposium.

Pages in this guide

Critical legal theory
A separate page in this guide
Feminist legal theory
Some suggested starting points, both print and online, on another page in this guide
HLA Hart
A separate page in this guide
Law & economics
A separate page in this guide
Marxist - Socialist legal theory
A separate page in this guide
New private law theory
A separate page in this guide
Political jurisprudence - Positivism
A separate page in this guide
Ronald Dworkin
A separate page in this guide

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