ABSTRACT
Private law covers a range of areas such as torts, contract law and property and its focus is on the rights we have against one another. It is often contrasted with public law, which is concerned with our rights against the state. Attempts to theorize private law have elicited widespread criticism for failing to explain its doctrines. Using RM Hare’s two-level theory, this chapter sketches a utilitarian account of private law and then applies it to several areas of doctrine. It will be demonstrated that many areas of private law can be explained in utilitarian terms.
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Craig Purshouse, A utilitarian theory of private law in Guillaume Tusseau (ed), Research Handbook on Law and Utilitarianism (ISBN: 9781789901719, eISBN: 9781789901726), pp 67–81. Published: 17 October 2024.
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