This article analyses HLA Hart's legal positivist theory through the life and music of the English band Oasis. It is argued that bringing Hart and Oasis into co-orbit reveals a fundamental ambiguity and anxiety within Hart's jurisprudential performance. It is argued that Oasis' self-confidence compares to Hart's certainty of a distinction between law and morality and Oasis' populism echoes Hart's claim of law as dependent on communal assent. However, an examination of Oasis also makes visible an essential critique of the certain and voluntary nature of Hart's system. Oasis' performances, on and offstage, highlight the undisclosed essentiality of violence within The Concept of Law that betrays ambiguity and anxiety regarding core elements of Hart's jurisprudential performance; the role of officials and the clarity of rules.
What is an "expected" or "labeled" adverse reaction versus an "unexpected" or "unlabeled" adverse event or experience? Unfortunately, present guidelines that assist with this assessment are not well defined, thus creating ambiguity in their interpretation and application. In an attempt to establish a definitive framework for assessing "expectedness " or "labeledness, "formalized guidelines for interpreting and formatting safe9 information have been drufied. Although this article is written from a United States regulatory perspective. many of the guidelines can be applied globally.
In Natural Law and Natural Rights, John Finnis delves into the past, attempting to revitalise the Thomist natural law tradition cut short by opposing philosophers such as David Hume. In this article, Finnis's efforts at revival are assessed by way of comparison with -and, indeed, contrast to -the life and art of musician David Bowie. In spite of their extravagant differences, there exist significant points of connection that allow Bowie to be used in interpreting Finnis's natural law. Bowie's work -for all its appeals to a Nietzschean ground zero for normative values -shares Finnis's concern with ordering affairs in a way that will realise humanity's great potential. In presenting enchanted worlds and evolved characters as an antidote to all that is drab and pointless, Bowie has something to tell his audience about how human beings can thrive. Likewise, natural law holds that a legal system should include certain content that guides people towards a life of 'flourishing'. Bowie and Finnis look to the past, plundering it for inspiration and using it as fuel to boost humankind forward. The analogy of Natural Law and Natural Rights and Bowie's magpie-like relationship to various popular music traditions ultimately reveals that natural law theory is not merely an objective and unchanging edict to be followed without question, but a legacy that is to be recreated by those who carry it into the future. Law's instruments of critique must not forget these transformative qualities.
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