Bentham on Democracy, Courts, and Codification

Description

Drawing upon original manuscripts and The Collected Works of Jeremy Bentham, this collection represents the latest scholarship on Bentham's late and mature thought on constitutional law. The contributions cover a diverse range of major topics, from official aptitude or competency to the interests of women, and explore Bentham's writings on courts, codification, and cosmopolitanism. Together, its chapters challenge the received notion, based on early jurisprudential writings, that Bentham's constitutional thought is authoritarian, and show that Bentham, as a constitutional theorist, offers a distinctive liberal perspective. Freeing Bentham's theories from their long sentences and unfamiliar terminology, these essays make accessible Bentham's subtle and important ideas on liberal democracy. By shining a light on Bentham's mature thought, this volume offers a refreshingly comprehensive, detailed, and authentic account of Bentham's theory of democracy.

Philip Schofield is Director of the Bentham Project, Faculty of Laws, University College London, and General Editor of the new authoritative edition of The Collected Works of Jeremy Bentham. He is the author of Utility and Democracy: The Political Thought of Jeremy Bentham (2006) and Bentham: A Guide for the Perplexed (2009). Xiaobo Zhai is Associate Professor, Faculty of Law, University of Macau. He is the co-editor of Bentham's Theory of Law and Public Opinion (2014) and Bentham Around the World (2021). He also writes on legal philosophy, constitutional theory, and Chinese law.