McCoubrey & White's Textbook on Jurisprudence

Publisher: Oxford University Press

Author: James Penner

Price: £28.99

Edition: 4th Edition (August 2008)

ISBN: 978-0-19-929986-7

Buy from OUP: Click Here

For many students, jurisprudence is often a frustrating and difficult topic to understand.  Struggling readers need a clear and concise explanation of the various theories and approaches in one textbook.  Fortunately, the popular edition of McCoubrey & White's Textbook on Jurisprudence provides exactly this.

For this fourth edition, James Penner takes over authorship from Hilaire McCoubrey (following his unfortunate death) and Nigel White.  Penner says (quite rightly in my view) that jurisprudence will not make you a better lawyer in any direct way but will make you a better thinker, better at spotting flaws in arguments and better at thinking around problems.  To really understand jurisprudence, you need to understand the basic range of arguments which often takes a disproportionate length of time unless you have a text like McCoubrey & White's Textbook on Jurisprudence to hand.

McCoubrey & White's Textbook on Jurisprudence adopts a logical and straight-forward approach to the material.  It initially explains what jurisprudence is and then follows it by looking at the theories like classical natural law, classical legal positivism and legal realism.  Following this, the text considers specific authors like Hart, Fuller, Finnis, Raz and Marx.  Finally, it looks at topics like critical legal studies, postmodern legal theory and economic legal theory.  Each chapter is impressively written and engagingly explains the key issues and principles in a logical, thought-provoking and accessible way: this is some achievement!

For my part, McCoubrey & White's Textbook on Jurisprudence was a life-saver as an undergraduate.  I am pleased that this new edition, with a new author, builds upon the superb work of the previous authors meaning it is, and continues to be, an indispensible guide and overview on jurisprudence and its various theories.  It is clearly and concisely written whilst being, at the same time, thought-provoking and easy to read.  If you need a textbook explaining jurisprudence, there is no better option.

Reviewed on 28 March 2009

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