Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-t5tsf Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-09T15:56:01.600Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Law, Economics, and Post-Realist Explanation

Review products

Robert Cooter And Thomas Ulen. Law And Economics. Glenview, Il: Scott, Foresman & Co., 1988. 644 pp.
Victor P. Goldberg (Ed.). Readings In The Economics Of Contract Law. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1989. 272 pp. $44.50 cloth; $14.95 paper.
William H. Landes and Richard A. Posner. The Economic Structure of Tort Law. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1987. 352 pp. $27.50.

Show more reviewed productsShow more reviewed products

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 July 2024

Jason Scott Johnston
Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

An abstract is not available for this content so a preview has been provided. As you have access to this content, a full PDF is available via the ‘Save PDF’ action button.
Image of the first page of this content. For PDF version, please use the ‘Save PDF’ preceeding this image.'
Type
Review Essay
Information
Law & Society Review , Volume 24 , Issue 5 , 1990 , pp. 1217 - 1254
Copyright
Copyright © 1990 The Law and Society Association.

Footnotes

For helpful comments on an earlier draft, I am grateful to Ian Ayres, Steven Croley, David Partlett, Richard Posner, Robert Rasmussen, and especially to Joe Sanders.

References

References

ACKERMAN, Bruce A. (1984) Reconstructing American Law. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
ACHINSTEIN, Peter (1983) The Nature of Explanation. New York: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
ARROW, Kenneth J. (1968) “Mathematical Models in the Social Sciences,” in Brodbeck, M. (ed.), Readings in the Philosophy of the Social Sciences. New York: Macmillan.Google Scholar
AYRES, Ian (1990) “Playing Games with the Law” (Book Review), 42 Stanford Law Review 1291.Google Scholar
AYRES, Ian, and John J., DONOHUE (1987) “Review Essay: Posner's Symphony No. 3: Thinking About the Unthinkable,” 39 Stanford Law Review 791.Google Scholar
AYRES, Ian, and Robert, GERTNER (1989) “Filling Gaps in Incomplete Contracts: An Economic Theory of Default Rules in Contract Law,” 99 Yale Law Journal 87.Google Scholar
BALKIN, J. M. (1987) “Book Review Essay: Too Good To Be True: The Positive Economic Theory of Law,” 87 Columbia Law Review 1447.Google Scholar
BERGER, Lawrence A. (1989) “Economics and Hermeneutics,” 5 Economics and Philosophy 209.Google Scholar
BLAUG, Mark (1980) The Methodology of Economics: Or How Economists Explain. New York: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
BOLAND, Lawrence A. (1982) The Foundations of Economic Method. London: Allen & Unwin.Google Scholar
BRODBECK, May (ed.) (1968a) Readings in the Philosophy of the Social Sciences. New York: Macmillan.Google Scholar
BRODBECK, May (ed.) (1968b) “Explanation, Prediction and Imperfect Knowledge,” in Brodbeck, M. (ed.), Readings in the Philosophy of the Social Sciences. New York: Macmillan.Google Scholar
BRODBECK, May (ed.) (1968c) “Methodological Individualism: Definition and Reduction,” in Brodbeck, M. (ed.), Readings in the Philosophy of the Social Sciences. New York: Macmillan.Google Scholar
BROWN, John Prather (1973) “Toward an Economic Theory of Liability,” 2 Journal of Legal Studies 323.Google Scholar
CALABRESI, Guido (1970) The Costs of Accidents. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.Google Scholar
CALDWELL, Bruce J. (1984) “Some Problems with Falsification in Economics,” 14 Philosophy of the Social Sciences 489.Google Scholar
CALDWELL, Bruce J. (1982) Beyond Positivism: Economic Methodology in the Twentieth Century. London: George Allen & Unwin.Google Scholar
CALFEE, John E., and Richard, CRASWELL (1984) “Some Effects of Uncertainty on Compliance with Legal Standards,” 70 Virginia Law Review 965.Google Scholar
COASE, Ronald H. (1960) “The Problem of Social Cost,” 3 Journal of Law and Economics 1.Google Scholar
COLEMAN, Jules L. (1988a) “Review Essay: The Economic Structure of Tort Law,” 97 Yale Law Journal 1233.Google Scholar
COLEMAN, Jules L. (1988b) Markets, Morals and the Law. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
COLEMAN, Jules L. (1984) “Economics and the Law: A Critical Review of the Foundations of the Economic Approach to Law,” 94 Ethics 649.Google Scholar
COOTER, Robert (1985) “Unity in Tort, Contract and Property: The Model of Precaution,” 73 California Law Review 1.Google Scholar
COOTER, Robert, and Daniel L., RUBINFELD (1990) “Trial Courts: An Economic Perspective,” 24 Law & Society Review 533.Google Scholar
COOTER, Robert, and Daniel L., RUBINFELD (1989) “Economic Analysis of Legal Disputes and Their Resolution,” 27 Journal of Economic Literature 1067.Google Scholar
COOTER, Robert, and Thomas, ULEN (1988) Law and Economics. Glenview, IL: Scott, Foresman & Co.Google Scholar
CRASWELL, Richard, and John E., CALFEE (1986) “Deterrence and Uncertain Legal Standards,” 2 Journal of Law, Economics and Organization 279.Google Scholar
CROLEY, Steven, and Jon, HANSON (1991), “What Liability Crisis? An Alternative Explanation for Recent Events in Products Liability,” 8 Yale Journal of Regulation 1.Google Scholar
CROSS, R. (1982) “The Duhem-Quine Thesis, Lakatos, and the Appraisal of Theories in Microeconomics,” 92 Economic Journal 320.Google Scholar
DANZIG, Richard (1975) “A Comment on the Jurisprudence of the Uniform Commercial Code,” 27 Stanford Law Review 621.Google Scholar
DONOHUE, John J. (1989a) “Diverting the Coasean River: Incentive Schemes to Reduce Unemployment Spells,” 99 Yale Law Journal 549.Google Scholar
DONOHUE, John J. (1989b) “Review Essay: The Law and Economics of Tort Law: The Profound Revolution,” 102 Harvard Law Review 1047.Google Scholar
DONOHUE, John J. (1988) “Law and Economics” The Road Not Taken,“ 22 Law & Society Review 903.Google Scholar
DWORKIN, Ronald M. (1980) “Is Wealth a Value?” 9 Journal of Legal Studies 191.Google Scholar
EASTERBROOK, Frank H. (1984) “The Court and the Economic System,” 98 Harvard Law Review 4.Google Scholar
ECONOMICS AND PHILOSOPHY (1988) “Symposium,” 4 Economics and Philosophy 89.Google Scholar
ELLICKSON, Robert C. (1989) “Bringing Culture and Human Frailty to Rational Actors: A Critique of Classical Law and Economics,” 65 Chicago-Kent Law Review 23.Google Scholar
ELSTER, Jon (1982) “Marxism, Functionalism and Game Theory: The Case for Methodological Individualism,” 11 Theory and Society 453.Google Scholar
FARRELL, Joseph P., and Carl, SHAPIRO (1989) “Optimal Contracts with Lock-In,” 79 American Economic Review 51.Google Scholar
FEYERABEND, Paul K. (1988a) “Knowledge and the Role of Theories,” 18 Philosophy of the Social Sciences 157.Google Scholar
FEYERABEND, Paul K. (1988b) Against Method. Rev. ed. London: Verso.Google Scholar
FRANK, Robert H. (1989) Passions Within Reason: The Strategic Role of the Emotions. New York: W. W. Norton & Co.Google Scholar
FRIEDMAN, Milton R. (1953) “The Methodology of Positive Economics,” in M. Friedman, Essays in Positive Economics. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
FULLER, Lon L. (1934) “American Legal Realism,” 82 University of Pennsylvania Law Review 429.Google Scholar
GARFINKEL, Alan (1981) Forms of Explanation. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.Google Scholar
GILMORE, Grant (1961) “Legal Realism: Its Cause and Cure,” 70 Yale Law Journal 1037.Google Scholar
GOLDBERG, Victor P. (ed.) (1989) Readings in the Economics of Contract Law. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
GOLDBERG, Victor P. (1980) “Relational Exchange: Economics and Complex Contracts,” 23 American Behavioral Scientist 337.Google Scholar
GREY, Thomas C. (1983) “Langdell's Orthodoxy,” 45 University of Pittsburgh Law Review 1.Google Scholar
GRIMES, Thomas R. (1987) “Explanation and the Poverty of Pragmatics,” 27 Erkenntnis 79.Google Scholar
HANDS, D. Wade (1987) “Review: Charles Taylor's Human Agency and Language: Philosophical Papers I and Philosophy and the Human Sciences: Philosophical Papers II,” 3 Economics and Philosophy 172.Google Scholar
HANSON, N. R. (1971) Observation and Explanation: A Guide to the Philosophy of Science. New York: Harper & Row.Google Scholar
HART, Oliver, and Bengt, HOLMSTROM (1987) “The Theory of Contracts,” in Bewley, T. F. (ed.), Advances in Economic Theory, Fifth World Congress. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
HAUSMAN, Daniel M. (1985) “Is Falsificationism Unpracticed or Unpractisable,” 15 Philosophy of the Social Sciences 313.Google Scholar
HAUSMAN, Daniel M. (1984) “Introduction,” in Hausman, D. (ed.) The Philosophy of Economics: An Anthology. New York: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
HAYEK, Friedrich A. von (1989) “The Pretence of Knowledge,” 79 American Economic Review 3.Google Scholar
HAYEK, Friedrich A. von (1964) “The Theory of Complex Phenomena,” in Bunge, M. (ed.) The Critical Approach to Science and Philosophy. London: Free Press of Glencoe.Google Scholar
HAYEK, Friedrich A. von (1952) The Counter-Revolution of Science. Glencoe, IL: Free Press.Google Scholar
HEINER, Ronald A. (1983) “The Origin of Predictable Behavior,” 73 American Economic Review 560.Google Scholar
HEMPEL, Carl G. (1968) “The Logic of Functional Analysis,” in Brodeck, M. (ed.) Readings in the Philosophy of the Social Sciences. New York: Macmillan.Google Scholar
HIRSCHMAN, Albert O. (1985) “Against Parsimony,” 1 Economics and Philosophy. 7.Google Scholar
HOFFMAN, Elizabeth, and Matthew L., SPITZER (1986) “Experimental Tests of the Coase Theorem with Large Bargaining Groups,” 15 Journal of Legal Studies 149.Google Scholar
HOFFMAN, Elizabeth, and Matthew L., SPITZER (1982) “The Coase Theorem: Some Experimental Tests,” 25 Journal of Law and Economics 73.Google Scholar
HOVENKAMP, Herbert (1990) “Positivism in Law and Economics,” 78 California Law Review 815.Google Scholar
JOHNSTON, Jason Scott (1991) “Uncertainty, Chaos and the Torts Process: An Economic Analysis of Legal Form,” 76 Cornell Law Review 401.Google Scholar
JOHNSTON, Jason Scott (1990) “Strategic Bargaining and the Economic Theory of Contract Default Rules,” 100 Yale Law Journal 615.Google Scholar
JOHNSTON, Jason Scott (1987) “Bayesian Fact-Finding and Efficiency: Toward an Economic Theory of Liability Under Uncertainty,” 61 Southern California Law Review 137.Google Scholar
JOSKOW, Paul L. (1987) “Contract Duration and Relationship-specific Investments: Evidence from Coal Markets,” 77 American Economic Review 168.Google Scholar
KALMAN, Laura (1986) Legal Realism at Yale, 1927–1960. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press.Google Scholar
KATZ, Avery (1990) “The Strategic Structure of Offer and Acceptance: Game Theory and the Law of Contract Formation,” 89 Michigan Law Review 215.Google Scholar
KELMAN, Mark (1987) A Guide to Critical Legal Studies. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
KENNEDY, Duncan (1980) “Cost-Benefit Analysis of Entitlement Problems: A Critique,” 33 Stanford Law Review 387.Google Scholar
KLAMER, Arjo (1987) “As If Economists and Their Subjects Were Rational,” in J. S. Nelson et al. (eds.), The Rhetoric of the Human Sciences. Madison: University of Wisconsin Press.Google Scholar
KLAMER, Arjo, McCLOSKEY, Donald M., and Robert M., SOLOW (eds.) (1988) The Consequences of Economic Rhetoric. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
KRONMAN, Anthony T. (1978) “Mistake, Disclosure, Information and the Law of Contracts,” 7 Journal of Legal Studies 1.Google Scholar
LACHMAN, Judith A. (1984) “Review Essay: Knowing and Showing Economics and Law,” 93 Yale Law Journal 1587.Google Scholar
LAKATOS, Imre (1970), “Falsification and the Methodology of Scientific Research Programmes,” in Lakatos, I. and Musgrave, A. (eds.), Criticism and the Growth of Knowledge. Aberdeen: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
LAKOFF, George (1987) Women, Fire and Dangerous Things: What Categories Reveal About the Mind. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
LANDES, William M., and Richard A., POSNER (1987) The Economic Structure of Tort Law. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
LEMPERT, Richard O., and Joseph, SANDERS (1986) An Invitation to Law and Social Science. New York: Longman.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
LEVY, David M. (1985) “The Impossibility of a Complete Methodological Individualist,” 1 Economics and Philosophy 101.Google Scholar
LEWIS, David K. (1969) Convention. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
LLEWELLYN, Karl N. (1940) “On Reading and Using the Newer Jurisprudence,” 40 Columbia Law Review 581.Google Scholar
LLEWELLYN, Karl N. (1931) “Some Realism About Realism: Responding to Dean Pound,” 44 Harvard Law Review 1222.Google Scholar
MACAULAY, Stewart (1963) “Non-contractual Relations in Business: A Preliminary Study,” 28 American Sociological Review 55.Google Scholar
McCLOSKEY, Donald N. (1988a) “The Consequences of Rhetoric,” in A. Klamer et al. (eds.), The Consequences of Economic Rhetoric. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
McCLOSKEY, Donald N. (1988b) “The Rhetoric of Law and Economics,” 86 Michigan Law Review 752.Google Scholar
McCLOSKEY, Donald N. (1985) The Rhetoric of Economics. Madison: University of Wisconsin Press.Google Scholar
MILL, John Stuart (1919) A System of Logic. New Impression. London: Longmans, Green & Co.Google Scholar
MILLER, Richard W. (1987) Fact and Method. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
MOORE, Michael S. (1984) Law and Psychiatry. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
NAGEL, Ernest (1973) “Assumptions in Economic Theory,” in Ryan, A. (ed.), The Philosophy of Social Explanation. London: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
ORBELL, John, VAN DE KRAGT, Alphons J. C., and Robyn M., DAWES (1988) “Explaining Discussion-induced Cooperation,” 54 Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 811.Google Scholar
ORDESHOOK, Peter C. (1986) Game Theory and Political Theory. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
OSBORNE, Martin J., and Ariel, RUBINSTEIN (1990) Bargaining and Markets. San Diego, CA: Academic Press.Google Scholar
PISANO, Gary P. (1989) “Using Equity Participation to Support Exchange: Evidence from the Biotechnology Industry,” 5 Journal of Law, Economics and Organization 109.Google Scholar
POLINSKY, A. Mitchell (1989) An Introduction to Law and Economics. 2d ed. Boston: Little, Brown & Co.Google Scholar
POLYANI, Michael (1974) “On the Introduction of Science into Moral Subjects,” in Schwartz, F. (ed.), Scientific Thought and Social Reality: Essays by Michael Polyani. New York: International Universities Press.Google Scholar
POPPER, Karl R. (1962) Conjectures and Refutations. New York: Basic Books.Google Scholar
POSNER, Richard A. (1986) Economic Analysis of Law. 3d ed. Boston: Little, Brown & Co.Google Scholar
POSNER, Richard A. (1981) The Economics of Justice. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
POUND, Roscoe (1931) “The Call for a Realist Jurisprudence,” 44 Harvard Law Review 697.Google Scholar
POUND, Roscoe (1919) “The Administrative Application of Legal Standards,” 44 American Bar Association Reporter 445.Google Scholar
PRIEST, George L. (1987) “The Current Insurance Crisis and Modern Tort Law,” 96 Yale Law Journal 1521.Google Scholar
PRIEST, George L. (1981) “A Theory of the Consumer Product Warranty,” 90 Yale Law Journal 1297.Google Scholar
PROSSER, William L., WADE, John W., and Victor E., SCHWARTZ (1988) Cases and Materials on the Law of Torts. 8th ed. Mineola, NY: Foundation Press.Google Scholar
QUINE, W. V., and J. S., ULLIAN (1978) The Web of Belief. 2d ed. New York: Random House.Google Scholar
RASMUSSEN, Eric (1989) Games and Information: An Introduction to Game Theory. Oxford: Basil Blackwell.Google Scholar
RISSLAND, Edwina L. (1990) “Artificial Intelligence and the Law: Stepping Stones to a Model of Legal Reasoning,” 99 Yale Law Journal 1957.Google Scholar
ROSENBERG, Alexander (1986) “Lakatosian Consolations for Economics,” 2 Economics and Philosophy 127.Google Scholar
SALMON, Merrilee H. (1989) “Explanation in the Social Sciences,” in Kitcher, P. and Salmon, W. C. (eds.), Scientific Explanation. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.Google Scholar
SALMON, Wesley C. (1989) “Four Decades of Scientific Explanation,” in P. Kitcher and W. C. Salmon (eds), Scientific Explanation. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.Google Scholar
SALMON, Wesley C. (1984) Scientific Explanation and the Casual Structure of the World. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
SALMON, Wesley C. (1971) Statistical Explanation and Statistical Relevance. Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
SANDERS, Joseph, and Craig, JOYCE (1990) “‘Off to the Races’: The 1980's Tort Crisis and the Law Reform Process,” 27 Houston Law Review 207.Google Scholar
SCHAUER, Frederick (1988) “Formalism,” 97 Yale Law Journal 509.Google Scholar
SCHEPPELE, Kim Lane (1988) Legal Secrets: Equality and Efficiency in the Common Law. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
SCHLEGEL, John Henry (1980) “American Legal Realism and Empirical Social Science: From the Yale Experience,” 28 Buffalo Law Review 459.Google Scholar
SCHWAB, Stewart (1988) “A Coasean Experiment on Contract Presumptions,” 17 Journal of Legal Studies 237.Google Scholar
SCHWARTZ, Alan, and Louis L., WILDE (1983) “Imperfect Information in Markets for Contract Terms: The Examples of Warranties and Security Interests,” 69 Virginia Law Review 1387.Google Scholar
SCHWARTZ, Gary T. (1979) “Foreword: Understanding Products Liability,” 67 California Law Review 435.Google Scholar
SHAVELL, Steven (1987) Economic Analysis of Accident Law. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
SOLOW, Robert M. (1988) “Comments from Inside Economics,” in A. Klamer et al. (eds.), The Consequences of Economic Rhetoric. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
TAYLOR, Charles (1985) “Social Theory as Practice,” in Philosophy and the Human Sciences: Philosophical Papers II. New York: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
TAYLOR, Charles (1977) “Interpretation and the Sciences of Man,” in Dallmayer, F. and McCarthy, T. (eds.), Understanding and Social Inquiry. Notre Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame Press.Google Scholar
TWINING, William L. (1973) Karl Llewellyn and the Realist Movement. London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson.Google Scholar
VAN FRAASSEN, Bas C. (1988) “The Pragmatic Theory of Explanation,” in Pitt, J. C. (ed.), Theories of Explanation. New York: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
VAN FRAASSEN, Bas C. (1980) The Scientific Image. New York: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
WATKINS, J. W. N. (1968) “Methodological Individualism and Social Tendencies,” in Brodbeck, M. (ed.), Readings in the Philosophy of the Social Sciences. New York: Macmillan.Google Scholar
WEINTRAUB, E. Roy (1985) General Equlibrium Analysis: Studies in Appraisal. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
WEST, Robin (1990) “Review Essay: Realism, Objectivity, and Law,” 99 Yale Law Journal 1473.Google Scholar
WHITE, James Boyd (1986) “Economics and Law: Two Cultures in Tension,” 54 Tennessee Law Review 161.Google Scholar
WILLIAMSON, Oliver E. (1985) The Economic Institutions of Capitalism. New York: Free Press.Google Scholar
WRIGHT, Larry (1976) Teleological Explanations. Berkeley: University of California Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

Cases Cited

American Hospital Supply Corp. v. Hospital Products Limited, 780 F.2d 589 (7th Cir. 1986).Google Scholar
Beshada v. Johns-Manville Products Corp., 90 N.J. 191, 447 A.2d 539 (1982).Google Scholar
Jordan v. Duff & Phelps, Inc., 815 F.2d 429 (7th Cir. 1987).Google Scholar
McMunn v. Hertz Equipment Rental Corp., 791 F.2d 88 (7th Cir. 1986).Google Scholar
United States v. Rockford Memorial Corp., 898 F.2d 1278 (7th Cir. 1990).Google Scholar