Law and Philosophical Theory

Thanos Zartaloudis is a Reader in Legal Theory and History at Kent Law School, University of Kent. He is also a Lecturer and Doctoral Advisor at the School of Architecture of the Architectural Association in London. He has published widely in philosophy and law and legal history. His most recent book is The Birth of Nomos (Edinburgh University Press, 2018).

• Introduction, Thanos Zartaloudis / 1. Illegalisms and the Law of Civil Society: From Foucault to Marx, Mikhaïl Xifaras / 2. Foucault’s ‘Distrust of Legalism’: On Human Rights and the Revolution in Iran, Jessica Whyte / 3. Actor-Network Theory and the Critique of Law, Kyle McGee / 4. Reopening the Archive: From Hypomnesis to the Ontology of Law, Hayley Gibson / 5. Notes on the Person and the Anthropological Machine of Law, Gian Giacomo Fusco / 6. Immanentism and Incorporation: How Law Makes Corporations, Tara Mulqueen / 7. Icons of Control: Deleuze, Signs, and Law, Nathan Moore / 8. Iconic Norms: A Theory of the Normative Nature of Images, Emanuele Coccia / 9. If Law Speaks, It Speaks of Enjoyment: Psychoanalysis and Desire, Justin Clemens / 10. Love, Law, Anarchism, Elena Loizidou / 11. Law as Myth – On the Young Walter Benjamin, Emanuele Castrucci / 12. The Being of the Volk: State, Führer and ‘The Political’ In Heidegger’s Seminars During the Kairos, Matthew Sharpe / 13. The Migration of Frontiers, William Watkin / 14. Elements of a Theology of Secularization, Anton Schütz / Notes on the Contributors / Index

The 14 essays Zartaloudis (legal theory and history, Kent Law School, Univ. of Kent, UK) has gathered are unusual, at least for those accustomed to the conventions of recent American jurisprudence and related philosophical writing. The collection takes as its subject the broad relationship between law and philosophy, looking at that relationship from a number of critical angles. Drawing on Foucault and Heidegger, Deleuze and Marx, the collection moves beyond the internal issues of British and American law to look at larger issues outside the borders of those countries. Zartaloudis includes important essays on human rights, social and corporate control, and especially the conflict between—and intersection of—the individual person and the state (both historical and current). For example, to understand the relevance of William Watkin’s contribution, “The Migration of Frontiers,” one need only read the day’s news to see the connection between theory and practice, explanatory narrative and social reality.Summing Up: Recommended. Upper-division undergraduates through faculty.