Thoughts on Sociological Jurisprudence: Juristic Thought and Social Inquiry (Roger Cotterrell)

• Date: 01 December 2019
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1111/raju.12261
• Author: Mauro Zamboni
• Published date: 01 December 2019

© 2019 The Author. Ratio Juris © 2019 John Wiley & Sons Ltd.

Ratio Juris. Vol. 32 No. 4 December 2019 (487–497)

NOTES • DISCUSSIONS • BOOK REVIEWS

Thoughts on Sociological Jurisprudence:

Juristic Thought and Social Inquiry

(Roger Cotterrell)

MAURO ZAMBONI

1. Introduction

Roger Cotterrell is a leading figure in the legal theoretical community, at least among

scholars who consider the relation between law and society to be central for better un-

derstanding the reasons behind the shape of contemporary legal thinking. He holds

an undisputed position as one of the European authors who, in the last decades, has

contributed most to narrowing the gap between legal scholars (and traditional legal

thinking) and social scholars. This is commendable, since the general attitude among

legal scholars is still to treat the social and legal fields as two communicating, but

separate, worlds. As a consequence of this mindset, legal scholars (at least European

ones)—despite what is said and all their good intentions—tend to dismiss sociolog-

ical works. These are considered to offer only an external perspective on the legal

phenomenon (overlooking the normative nature of the law). On their part, socially

oriented scholars treat traditional legal thinking as offering a very partial (and often

misleading) view of what law really is. Cotterrell’s strength lies in his capacity to gain

a high degree of respect in both fields.

Thus, the major contribution of Cotterrell’s scholarly production (and this latest

one in particular) consists in an effort to bridge the gap between the aforementioned

fields. On one side, social scientists find his works extremely useful for better under-

standing “how legal people think.” On the other side, legal scholars have benefitted

enormously from Cotterrell’s attempts to always contextualize legal thinking in the

reality in which it is produced, thus making it clearer why the legal discourse appears

as it does in a certain period and a certain place (see, e.g., Cotterrell 2005). This most

recent work in Cotterrell’s oeuvre, Sociological Jurisprudence: Juristic Thought and Social

Inquiry, does not fail such expectations, as the following discussion will show (see

Cotterrell 2018).

This review is divided into two main, interlinked paths: one more analytical and

the other of a critical nature. In the former, I will present the general benefits that