Those who declare allegiance to the banner of legal realism might just as easily be called sceptics (and they sometimes are) or even cynics. Indeed, many students—especially after their gruelling journey through legal positivism—find that they are in good company. The realists, they are relieved to discover, eschew the ponderous metaphysics which they discern in talk of legal concepts—be they ‘commands’, ‘rules’, ‘norms’, or indeed any construct which has no foundation in ‘reality’. If you have been disposed to feel similarly unhappy with the ‘journalism’ of juristic thinking in the work of Bentham, Austin, Hart, or Kelsen, you may well find succour in the movement which is (rather loosely) described as legal realism.
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Author(s): Raymond Wacks