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Article

Criminal law and the constitution of civil order

Details

Citation

Duff RA (2020) Criminal law and the constitution of civil order. University of Toronto Law Journal, 70 (Supplement 1), pp. 4-26. https://doi.org/10.3138/utlj.2019-0077

Abstract
Some of those who theorize criminal law in essentially political terms, as a species of ‘public law,’ argue that we should therefore reject legal moralism. I argue that they are right to reject the kind of legal moralism espoused by theorists such as Michael Moore (partly because such moralists cannot give a plausible account of the ambit and jurisdiction of domestic criminal law), but that we can construct a plausible version of legal moralism within the framework of a public law conception. This is a ‘political,’ or ‘public,’ legal moralism, according to which criminal law is properly concerned with public wrongs that violate the polity’s civil order. I explain these ideas of civil order and public wrongs, and the way in which criminal law can both help to constitute, and to sustain, a particular kind of civil order.

Keywords
civil order; criminal law; legal moralism; public law; public wrongs

Journal
University of Toronto Law Journal: Volume 70, Issue Supplement 1

StatusPublished
Publication date31/12/2020
Publication date online12/02/2020
Date accepted by journal12/02/2020
ISSN0042-0220
eISSN1710-1174

People (1)

Professor Antony Duff

Professor Antony Duff

Emeritus Professor, Philosophy