The Idea of Public Law

Front Cover
Oxford University Press, 2004 - Law - 188 pages
This book offers an answer to the question: what is public law? It suggests that an adequate explanation can only be given once public law is recognized to be an autonomous discipline, with its own distinctive methods and tasks. Martin Loughlin defends this claim by identifying the conceptual foundations of the public law: governing, politics, representation, sovereignty, constituent power, and rights. By explicating these basic elements of the subject, he seeks not only to lay bare its method but also to present a novelaccount of the idea of public law.

About the author (2004)


Martin Loughlin is Professor of Public Law at the London School of Economics and Political Science.

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