Scots Criminal Law "e; A Critical Analysis provides a clear statement of the current law for students and practitioners, with a theoretical and critical focus. This new edition has been updated to reflect changes in the law since the first edition publishe

This book examines the relationship between legal tradition and national identity to offer a critical and historical perspective on the study of criminal law. It develops a radically different approach to questions of responsibility and subjectivity, and was among the first studies to combine appreciation of the institutional and historical context in which criminal law is practised with a critical understanding of the law itself. Applying contemporary social theory to the particular case of nineteenth-century Scottish law, Lindsay Farmer is able to develop a critique of modern criminal law theory in general. He traces the development of the modern characteristics of criminal law and legal order, tracing the relationship between legal practice and national culture, and showing how contemporary criminal law theory fundamentally misrepresents the character of modern criminal justice.

Reprint of the first edition of one of the earliest systematic studies of the criminal law. Sir George MacKenzie of Rosenhugh [1636-1691], "became notable for his resistance to the pretensions of the Crown, but in 1677, he was made Lord Advocate and in the next few years prosecuted and persecuted Covenanters with such zeal as to earn the title 'The Bloody Mackenzie.' In many cases he strained the law so as to obtain a conviction.": Walker, Oxford Companion to Law 792. He is also well-known for having founded the Advocates Library, now the national law library for Scotland. In contrast to Mackenzie's behavior on the bench, the Laws and Customes is notably moderate, especially in the sections dealing with witchcraft.

Why did Enlightenment happen in Edinburgh?