Law in Politics, Politics in Law
David Feldman - Hart Publishing 2014
A great deal has been written on the
relationship between politics and law. Legislation, as a source of law, is often
highly political, and is the product of a process or the creation of officials
often closely bound into party politics. Legislation is also one of the
exclusive powers of the state. As such, legislation is plainly both practical
and inevitably political; at the same time most understandings of the
relationship between law and politics have been overwhelmingly theoretical. In
this light public law is often seen as part of the political order or as
inescapably partisan. We know relatively little about the real impact of law on
politicians through their legal advisers and civil servants. How do lawyers in
government see their roles and what use do they make of law? How does politics
actually affect the drafting of legislation or the making of policy?This volume
will begin to answer these and other questions about the practical, day-to-day
relationship between law and politics in a number of settings. It includes
chapters by current and former departmental legal advisers, drafters of
legislation, law reformers, judges and academics, who focus on what actually
happens when law meet politics in government.
