JURISPRUDENCE 2.4 SOCIOLOGICAL JURISPRUDENCE
SOCIOLOGICAL JURISPRUDENCE.
Law and society are the keywords here. How can law be used to control and develop the society. Law as a tool for social engineering. How can law be applied in action rather than just theorising about law? They reject naturalism. The Trichotomy of Sociological Jurisprudence include:
Sociological Jurisprudence:
Socio-Legal Studies:
Sociology of Law.
Roscoe Pound is referred to as the father of sociological jurisprudence. Durkheim, then Webber, Ehrlich, Comte 1798-1857 invented the word sociology. Elegido.
In Roscoe Pound’s “The Jurisprudence” saw law as areconciler of conflicting interest (just like Jhering) which includes individual interests (property, freedom of contract…) and public/Societal interest (health, safety, order). Law should satisfy as many interests as possible.
Critique:
Terms are Vague and difficult to identify… his categorization of interest is grandiose.
His theory is formalistic and contradictory.
Eugene Ehrlich: “Living Law” that law should be distinguished from norms of decision (i.e. rules to be found in civil codes, statutes and judicial decision). He says living law dominates life itself. He notes: “an attempt to imprison the law of a time or of a people within the sections of a code is about as reasonable as to attempt to confine a stream within a pond… the water that is put in the pond is no longer a living stream but a stagnant pool”.
Criticised for not providing a coherent theory of the relationship between the living law and the state.
Emile Durkheim: law is what holds the society together.
Marx Weber: that the key to legal thought is rationality.
Socio-legal Studies: nan approach to investigate the relationship between law and other social phenomenon.
Sociology of Law: Professor Alan Hunt and Roger Cotterrell… study society as a whole and tell us what the law should do in the society… what law should correct in the society.
Professor Oyebode in Law and Nation Building Chapter 5 and T.O Elias in Law and social Change in Nigeria note dthat the lawyer has a vital role to play in the society being the defender and conservator of basic human rights in the society.
