Between the Norm and the Exception The Frankfurt School and the Rule of Law

by Scheuerman, William E.

• ISBN13: 9780262691963
• ISBN10: 0262691965
• Edition: Reprint
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 1997-01-22
• Publisher: The MIT Press

Summary

Winner, 1996 Elaine and David Spitz Book Prize for the best book on liberal and democratic theory, Conference for the Study of Political Thought. Winner, 1994 First Book Prize, Foundations of Political Thought Organized Section, American Political Science Association. Between the Norm and the Exceptioncontributes historical insight to the ongoing debate over the future of the rule of law in welfare-state capitalist democracies. The core issue is whether or not society can offer its citizens welfare-state guarantees and still preserve the liberal vision of a norm-based legal system. Franz Neumann and Otto Kirchheimer, in an age dominated by Hitler and Stalin, sought to establish a sound theoretical basis for the "rule of law" ideal. As an outcome of their sophisticated understanding of the liberal political tradition, their writings suggest a theoretical missed opportunity, an alternative critical theory that might usefully be applied in understanding (and perhaps countering) the contemporary trend toward the deformalization of law.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments	ix
Introduction: Recovering the Rule of Law	1	(10)
I Carl Schmitt Meets Karl Marx	11	(54)
1 A Totalitarian Concept of the Political	13	(26)
2 The Social Rule of Law	39	(26)
II Legality and Legitimacy	65	(56)
3 Parliamentary Legality or Plebiscitary Dictatorship?	67	(30)
4 The Unfinished Agenda of Rational Law	97	(24)
III Sovereignty and Its Discontents	121	(68)
5 The Permanent State of Emergency	123	(34)
6 Beyond State Sovereignty	157	(32)
IV Toward the Democratic Rule of Law	189	(56)
7 A Democratic Concept of the Political	191	(28)
8 Between the Norm and the Exception	219	(26)
Conclusion: The Presence of the Past	245	(4)
Notes	249	(52)
Bibliography	301	(26)
Index	327