Law and Social Economics

1. Front Matter

   Pages i-xii

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2. Foundations

   1. Front Matter

      Pages 1-1

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   2. Toward a Contractarian Theory of Law

      • Claire Finkelstein

      Pages 3-20

   3. Environmental Ethics, Economics, and Property Law

      • Steven McMullen, Daniel Molling

      Pages 21-40

   4. Individual Rights, Economic Transactions, and Recognition: A Legal Approach to Social Economics

      • Stefano Solari

      Pages 41-59

   5. Institutionalist Method and Forensic Proof

      • Robert M. LaJeunesse

      Pages 61-75

   6. Retributivist Justice and Dignity: Finding a Role for Economics in Criminal Justice

      • Mark D. White

      Pages 77-96

3. Applications

   1. Front Matter

      Pages 97-97

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   2. Female Genital Mutilation and the Law: A Qualitative Case Study

      • Regina Gemignani, Quentin Wodon

      Pages 99-121

   3. An Unexamined Oxymoron: Trust but Verify

      • David George

      Pages 123-137

   4. On the Question of Court Activism and Economic Interests in Nineteenth-Century Married Women’s Property Law

      • Daniel MacDonald

      Pages 139-160

   5. Divergent Outcomes of Land Rights Claims of Indigenous Peoples in the United States

      • Wayne Edwards

      Pages 161-181

   6. Punitive (and) Pain-and-Suffering Damages in Brazil

      • Osny da Silva Filho

      Pages 183-207

4. Back Matter

   Pages 209-217

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This edited volume is the first collection of essays exploring the intersection of social economics and the law, providing alternatives to neoclassical law-and-economics and applying them to real-world issues. Law is a social enterprise concerned with values such as justice, dignity, and equality, as well as efficiency - which is the same way that social economists conceive of the economy itself. Social economists and legal scholars alike need to acknowledge the interrelationship between the economy and the law in a broader ethical context than enabled by mainstream law-and-economics. The ten chapters in Law and Social Economics, written by an international assortment of scholars from economics, philosophy, and law, employ a wide variety of approaches and methods to show how a more ethically nuanced approach to economics and the law can illuminate both fields and open up new avenues for studying social-economic behavior, policy, and outcomes in all their ethical and legal complexity.

• social economics
• law
• dignity
• values
• ethics
• legal studies
• law and society
• law and economics
• Brazil
• economics
• environment
• environmental ethics
• foundation
• trust
• USA

• Department of Philosophy, College of Staten Island/CUNY, USA

  Mark D. White

Wayne Edwards, University of Nebraska at Kearney, USA Claire Finkelstein, University of Pennsylvania, USA Regina Gemignani, The World Bank David George, La Salle University, USA Robert LaJeunesse, US Equal Employment Opportunity Commission Daniel MacDonald, California State University, San Bernardino, USA Steven McMullen, Hope College, USA Daniel Molling, Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City, USA Osny da Silva Filho, Fundação Getulio Vargas, Brazil Stefano Solari, University of Padua, Italy Quentin Wodon, The World Bank

Policies and ethics