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Wednesday, 5 January 2022

A selection of law ebooks were purchased in October, in association with the ebooks@cambridge team. These are alll available through iDiscover, and include:

Elliott & Quinn's Contract Law (12th edition), by Catherine Elliott and Frances Quinn (Pearson, 2019)

Elliott & Quinn’s Contract Law explains the fundamental legal principles in this area in clear, straightforward language but without compromising on academic rigour; provides succinct case summaries illustrating the key facts and the legal principles arising from core cases and illustrates the legal issues behind high profile news stories setting the law in its real-world context.

Hans Kelsen : Biographie eines Rechtswissenschaftlers, by Thomas Olechowski; with Jürgen Busch, Tamara Ehs, Miriam Gassner and Stefan Wedrac (Mohr Siebeck, 2021)

This biography traces the life of the legal philosopher Hans Kelsen (1881–1973), the architect of the Federal Constitutional Law of 1920, which is still in force in Austria until today. Kelsen is also world-renowned as the founder of the Pure Theory of Law.  

International Law and Humanitarian Assistance : A Crosscut Through Legal Issues Pertaining to Humanitarianism, edited by Hans-Joachim Heintze and  Andrej Zwitter (Springer, 2011)

It is becoming increasingly apparent that there are major gaps in International Humanitarian Law and Public International Law in the area of humanitarian assistance. In response international organizations such as the UN and the EU are developing their own legal frameworks for humanitarian assistance and the body of customary law and so-called international disaster response law is growing steadily. This however shows that a coherent body of law is far from being a given. The legal reality of international law pertaining to emergency response is rather broadly spread over various international legal fields and related documents, covering situations of armed conflict and natural disasters. This book is one of the first attempts of linking different legal areas in the growing field of what could be called the international law of humanitarian assistance.

Justice in Transactions : A Theory of Contract Law, by Peter Benson (The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 2019)

Can we account for contract law on a moral basis that is acceptable from the standpoint of liberal justice? To answer this question, Peter Benson develops a theory of contract that is completely independent of—and arguably superior to—long-dominant views, which take contract law to be justified on the basis of economics or promissory morality. Through a detailed analysis of contract principles and doctrines, Benson brings out the specific normative conception underpinning the whole of contract law. Contract, he argues, is best explained as a transfer of rights, which is complete at the moment of agreement and is governed by a definite conception of justice—justice in transactions. Benson’s analysis provides what John Rawls called a public basis of justification, which is as essential to the liberal legitimacy of contract as to any other form of coercive law. The argument of Justice in Transactions is expressly complementary to Rawls’s, presenting an original justification designed specifically for transactions, as distinguished from the background institutions to which Rawls’s own theory applies. The result is a field-defining work offering a comprehensive theory of contract law. Benson shows that contract law is both justified in its own right and fully congruent with other domains—moral, economic, and political—of liberal society.

Leading Works in Law and Social Justice, edited by Faith Gordon and Daniel Newman (Routledge, 2021)

This book assesses the role of social justice in legal scholarship and its potential future development by focusing upon the ‘leading works’ of the discipline.The rise of socio-legal studies over recent decades has led to a more interdisciplinary approach to the study of law, which prioritises placing law into its wider social context. Recognising the role that culture, economics and politics play in the development of law is important in order to fully understand the position and impact of law in society. Innovative and written in an engaging way, this collection includes leading and emerging scholars from across the world. Each contributor has been invited to select and analyse a ‘leading work’, a publication which has for them shed light on the way that law and social justice are interlinked and has influenced their own understanding, scholarship, advocacy, and, in some instances, activism. The book also includes a specially written foreword and afterword, which critically reflect upon the contributions of the 'leading works' to consider the role that social justice has played in law and legal education and the likely future path for social justice in legal scholarship. This book will be an essential resource for all those working in the areas of social justice, socio-legal studies and legal philosophy. It will be of wider interest to the social sciences more generally.

Religion and the Constitution (4th edition), by Michael W. McConnell, Thomas C. Berg and Christopher C. Lund (Wolters Kluwer, 2016)

Religion and the Constitution, Fourth Edition, written by a team of well-known Constitutional Law scholars, thoughtfully examines the relationship between government and religion within the framework of the U.S. Constitution. This classroom-tested casebook is suitable for courses in Religious Liberty, Religion and the Constitution, or Religious Institutions and the Law. The Fourth Edition has been completely updated with discussions of recent important cases and includes expanded discussion of key topic areas. 

The International Rule of Law: Scope, Subjects, Requirements, by Denise Wohlwend (Edward Elgar, 2021)

This insightful book offers an in-depth examination of whether, and if so how and to what degree, contemporary international law can and should conform to and develop the rule of law principle. Motivated by the neglect of conceptual and normative theorizing of the international rule of law within contemporary international legal scholarship, Denise Wohlwend analyses the moral and legal principle of the rule of law in the international legal order.

The Routledge Handbook of EU Copyright Law, edited by edited by Eleonora Rosati (Routledge, 2021)

The Routledge Handbook of EU Copyright Law provides a definitive survey of copyright harmonization in the European Union, capturing the essential and relevant issues of this relatively recent phenomenon. Over the past few years, two themes have emerged: on the one hand, copyright policy and legislative initiatives have intensified; on the other hand, the large number of references to the Court of Justice of the European Union has substantially shaped the EU copyright framework and, with it, the copyright framework of individual EU Member States. This handbook is a detailed reference source of original contributions which analyze and critically evaluate the state of EU copyright law with a view to detecting the key trends and patterns in the evolution of EU copyright, weighing the benefits and disadvantages of such evolution. It covers a broad range of topics through clusters focused on: the history and approaches to EU copyright harmonization; harmonization in the areas of exclusive rights, exceptions and limitations, and enforcement; copyright policy and legacy of harmonization. With contributions from a selection of highly regarded and leading scholars in this field, the Routledge Handbook on European Copyright Law is an essential resource for students and scholars who are interested in the field of copyright law.

All of these ebooks are available to current University of Cambridge staff and students with a Raven password. A full list of ebook platforms can be viewed via the ebooks@cambridge LibGuide

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