Therapeutic Jurisprudence
Therapeutic jurisprudence is the study of the law’s healing potential (Wexler & Winick, 1996; Wexler & Winick, 1991; Winick, 2005; Winick, 1997b). An interdisciplinary approach to legal scholarship that has a law reform agenda, therapeutic jurisprudence seeks to assess the therapeutic and counter-therapeutic consequences of the law and how it is applied, as well as to increase the former and diminish the latter. This book chapter discusses how therapeutic jurisprudence contributes to the functioning of drug treatment courts. [1]
American Jurisprudence, 1870-1970: A History
From 1870 to 1940, the principal motivation for most theorists was to make scholarly work in law scientific. Early American scholars attempted to construct a respectable discipline along two quite different lines. Some sought to ground legal scholarship in an analytical science built in definition and classification. Others sought to base legal knowledge in history with principles of legal evolution as the guide to understanding. In each case, the primary purpose of developing theoretical explanations was to demonstrate that the study of law involved much more than the mere systemization of professional practices and that it required sophisticated learning and intellectual skill. Dissatisfaction with the existing legal system was a motivating force in producing legal theory from 1930 to 1970. American legal realists during this period made negative criticism central to their efforts. They attacked the premises of the dominant expository paradigm and cast serious doubts about its validity by demonstrating that formal rules of law were highly ambiguous and often contradictory. In contrast to the realists, the evolutionists attempted to explain law as a historical product. Additional schools of legal thought included the Poundians and the Thomists. The author discusses the social science of law, natural law, and the contributions of migrant scholars. Supplemental legal history information is appended. References and notes. [2]
PARIKH’S TEXT BOOK OF MEDICAL JURISPRUDENCE AND TOXICOLOGY FOR CLASSROOMS AND COURTROOMS – THIRD EDITION
THIS USEFUL REFERENCE FOR PERSONS INTERESTED IN THE PRACTICAL APPLICATION OF FORENSIC MEDICINE DOCUMENTS THE MEANINGFUL INTERRELATIONSHIP OF MEDICINE, SCIENCE, AND THE LAW. THE MEDICAL JURISPRUDENCE SECTION PROVIDES INFORMATION ON IDENTIFYING MUTILATED BODIES, MEDICOLEGAL AUTOPSY, EXHUMATION, MEDICOLEGAL ASPECTS OF DEATH, AND DEATHS FROM ASPHYXIA, STARVATION, COLD, AND HEAT. ALSO DISCUSSED ARE MECHANICAL INJURIES, TRAUMA, TRAFFIC ACCIDENTS, SEXUAL OFFENSES, AND FORENSIC SCIENCE LABORATORIES AND CRIME DETECTION. THE TOXICOLOGY SECTION DESCRIBES IN DETAIL COMMON HOUSEHOLD POISONS, MINERAL ACIDS AND ALKALIS, ORGANIC ACIDS, VEGETABLE ACID POISONS, NONMETALLIC POISONS, METALLIC POISONS, VEGETABLE POISONS, ANIMAL POISONS, MECHANICAL POISONS, AND FOOD POISONING AND POISONOUS FOODS. ADDITIONAL TOXICOLOGY CHAPTERS FOCUS ON SOMNIFEROUS POISONS, DRUG ADDICTION AND DRUG HABITS, INEBRIANT POISONS, ANESTHETICS, SEDATIVES AND HYPNOTICS, FUELS, INSECTICIDES, DELIRIANT POISONS, SPINAL POISONS, PERIPHERAL NERVE POISONS, CARDIAC POISONS, ASPHYXIANTS, ANALGESICS, TRANQUILIZERS, STIMULANTS, ANTIDEPRESSANTS, AND HALLUCINOGENS. PHOTOGRAPHS AND LINE DRAWINGS CLARIFY THE TEXT. SUITABLE CASE EXAMPLES INDICATE THE PRACTICAL APPLICATIONS OF THE INFORMATION. APPENDIXES AND AN INDEX ARE PROVIDED. (LWM) [3]
Women’s Reproductive Rights: A Judicial Rhetoric towards a Privacy Jurisprudence
Women’s reproductive rights or abortion decisions are complex and riddled with moral considerations. It is for that reason that women must be permitted to make the decision themselves. This sentiment echoes the notion that women are to be left alone with regard to their reproductive rights decisions. Such decisions will have an impact on their family and professional work commitments. It is the anti-choice position that drains the abortion decision of its moral complexity by insisting that it is always wrong. It is amidst this debacle that this research embarked on a judicial discourse comprising of case law in several jurisdictions to explain the notion of a privacy jurisprudence in order to teach the wider community. A privacy jurisprudence, as adumbrated in this study, engenders certain fundamental constitutional guarantees against governmental control or state regulations, which aim to invade the area of protected freedoms, such as abortion decisions by women and the use of contraceptives. In America, state interference has been detested because it wanted to foil women’s right to privacy, whereas in South Africa, state interference is welcomed in the sense that the state must avail resources in order for women to exercise their right to freedom of decision. Botswana recently encountered an inertia with regard to legal literature on women’s reproductive rights and even a dearth of research in the medical arena on the issue. It is suggested that Botswana follow in the footsteps of South Africa and disentangles herself from her zealous patriarchal stand and elevate women so that the latter can be free to exercise their right to privacy in abortion decision or reproductive rights.
The discourse towards a privacy jurisprudence enjoys elaborative discussion in the study and evokes some pointers for jurisdictions worldwide to take recognition. [4]
Reference
[1] Wexler, D.B. and Winick, B.J., 2008. Therapeutic jurisprudence. Principles of Addiction Medicine,.
[2] Herget, J.E., 1990. American jurisprudence, 1870-1970: a history. Rice University Press.
[3] Parikh, C.K., 1979. Parikh’s text book of medical jurisprudence and toxicology: for classrooms and courtrooms. Medical publications.
[4] P. Swartz, N. (2018) “Women’s Reproductive Rights: A Judicial Rhetoric towards a Privacy Jurisprudence”, Journal of Education, Society and Behavioural Science, 18(2), pp. 1-14. doi: 10.9734/BJESBS/2016/28733.
