First Published in 1998. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.

This book is an unconventional reappraisal of Soviet law: a field that is ripe for re-evaluation, now that it is clear of Cold War cobwebs; and, as this book shows, one that is surprisingly topical and newly compelling. Scott Newton argues here that the Soviet order was a work of law. Drawing on a wide range of sources – including Russian-language Soviet statues and regulations, jurisprudence, legal theory, and English-language ‘legal Kremlinology’ – this book analyses the central significance of law in the design and operation of Soviet economic, political, and social institutions. In arguing that it was an exemplary, rather than aberrant, case of the uses to which law was put in twentieth-century industrialised societies, Law and the Making of the Soviet World: The Red Demiurge provides an insightful account of both the significance of modern law in the Soviet case and the significance of the Soviet case for modern law.

This edited volume explores ideas of legal realism which emerge through the works of Russian legal philosophers. Apart from the well-known American and Scandinavian versions of legal realism, there also exists a Russian one: readers will discover fresh perspectives and that the collection of early twentieth century ideas on law discussed in Russia can be understood as a unified school of legal thought – as Russian legal realism. These chapters by renowned European and Eastern European legal philosophers add to ongoing discussions about the nature of law, especially in the context of developments around our scientific knowledge about the mind and behaviour. Analyses of legal phenomena carried out by legal realists in Russia offer novel arguments in favour of embracing psychological and sociological perspectives on the law. The book includes analysis of the St. Petersburg school of legal philosophy and Leon Petrażycki’s psychological theory of law. This original and multifaceted research on Russian realists is of considerable value to an international audience. Researchers and postgraduate students of law, legal theory and legal ethics will find the book particularly appealing, but it will also interest those investigating the philosophy or sociology of law, or legal history.

The essays in this volume reassess pre-revolutionary Russian legal culture, the debates of the 1920s over the role of law under socialism, and the abrupt and bloody termination of the debate which took place in the 1930s.

The Latvian-born legal theorist P.I. Stuchka (1865-1932), generally recognized as one of the principal architects of modern Soviet legal theory and the Soviet legal system itself, was a prodigious author and editor. Twenty essays by Stuchka written between 1917 and 1931 were selected for translation in this volume. Annotation copyrighted by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR

This book focuses on the way in which legal historians and legal scientists used the past to legitimize, challenge, explain and familiarize the socialist legal orders, which were backed by dictatorial governments. The volume studies legal historians and legal histories written in Eastern European countries during the socialist era after the Second World War. The book investigates whether there was a unified form of socialist legal historiography, and if so, what can be said of its common features. The individual chapters of this volume concentrate on the regimes that situate between the Russian, and later Soviet, legal culture and the area covered by the German Civil Code. Hence, the geographical focus of the book is on East Germany, Russia, the Baltic states, Poland and Hungary. The approach is transnational, focusing on the interaction and intertwinement of the then hegemonic communist ideology and the ideas of law and justice, as they appeared in the writings of legal historians of the socialist legal orders. Such an angle enables concentration on the dynamics between politics and law as well as identities and legal history. Studying the socialist interpretations of legal history reveals the ways in which the 20th century legal scholars, situated between legal renewal and political guidance gave legitimacy to, struggled to come to terms with, and sketched the future of the socialist legal orders. The book will be a valuable resource for academics and researchers working in the areas of Legal History, Jurisprudence and Philosophy of Law and European Studies. The Open Access version of this book, available at https://www.taylorfrancis.com/books/socialism-legal-history-ville-erkkil%C3%A4-hans-peter-haferkamp/e/10.4324/9780367814670?context=ubx&refId=2db6d49f-af1c-4b51-9503-9673a131f541, has been made available under a Creative Commons Attribution-Non Commercial-No Derivatives 4.0 license.”