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A concise note on Peter Fitzpatrick's ‘Racism and the innocence of law’

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 May 2021

Patricia Tuitt
Patricia Tuitt*
Affiliation:
Legal Academic, patriciatuitt.com,
*
*Corresponding author. E-mail: [email protected]
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Abstract

I have long felt that Peter Fitzpatrick's 1987 paper, ‘Racism and the innocence of law’, should be closely studied by all law students during, or shortly after, their induction to the study of law. These concise notes on the paper are written primarily in tribute to a friend, colleague and mentor but, in writing them, I hope also to demonstrate how this early instance of a theory about how law is intertwined in racial capitalism could be taught in those law schools that harbour ambitions to be not only critical, but also decolonial. Inevitably, in such a short piece, choices have had to be made about which aspects of the paper to foreground and which to leave out entirely. I trust that my decision to focus on those aspects that can be more readily comprehended by a student with limited knowledge of legal theory and substantive fields of law will not be thought to have unduly watered down its meaning.

Keywords

racial capitalismequality lawlaw and justiciabilitycritical legal pedagogyliberal legality
Type
Article
Information
International Journal of Law in Context , Volume 17 , Special Issue 1: Celebration of Peter Fitzpatrick and his Scholarship , March 2021 , pp. 36 - 39
Copyright
Copyright © The Author(s) 2021. Published by Cambridge University Press

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References

Fitzpatrick, P (1987) Racism and the innocence of law. Journal of Law and Society 14, 119–132.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
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