PH439      Half Unit
Anarchy, Authority and Evidence: Topics in Philosophy of Law

This information is for the 2025/26 session.

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Anarchy, Authority and Evidence tackles philosophical questions about legal systems and criminal justice. No prior legal knowledge is required.

The first half of the course typically discusses big picture questions about the purpose of law and what, if anything, the criminal justice system achieves. For example, we might consider the moral obligation to obey the law, the viability of political anarchism, the justification of punishment, dispute-resolution without the state, and the moral status of civil or violent disobedience.

The second half of the course usually takes a closer, critical look at how criminal justice works in practice. For example, we might discuss questions like: What is the fairest way to evaluate allegations of sexual criminality? Should we use algorithms to make decisions about parole or punishment severity? Should we defer to juries or instead use professional judges? Does it make sense to treat a corporation as morally responsible? What alternatives are there to prisons?

By the end of the course, you will have a solid understanding of foundational and applied questions in philosophy of law - as well as a better grasp of how the law operates in practice.

10 hours of seminars and 10 hours of lectures in the Autumn Term.

This course has a reading week in Week 6 of Autumn Term.

There will be a student-led group debate for which feedback will be provided.

Formative feedback will be given on a paper that will then be 'expanded and resubmitted' for the summative assessment. 

The following are readings that discuss representative issues covered in this course:

• Delmas, Candice (2018). A Duty to Resist: When Disobedience Should Be Uncivil. New York, USA: Oxford University Press.
• Kropotkin, Petr (2015). The Conquest of Bread. Penguin.
• Huemer, Michael (2012). The Problem of Political Authority: An Examination of the Right to
• Coerce and the Duty to Obey. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan.
• Nagel, Thomas (1976) Moral Luck. Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, Supplementary Volumes. Vol. 50
• Jorgensen, Renée (2020). The rational impermissibility of accepting (some) racial generalizations. Synthese 197 (6):2415-2431.
• Hoskins, Zachary (2017). Punishment. Analysis 77 (3): 619–632.
• King, 'Letter from Birmingham Jail'

Exam (50%), duration: 180 Minutes in the Spring exam period

Essay (50%, 3500 words)

The summative essay will be constructed using the shorter (compulsory) formative essay as the basis. This shorter paper will be 'expanded and resubmitted' for summative assessment, making use of the feedback provided by the lecturers. 

There is a summative e-exam weighting 50%.