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Between the Norm and the Exception contributes historical insight to the ongoing debate over the future of the rule of law in welfare-state capitalist democracies. The core issue is whether or not society can offer its citizens welfare-state guarantees and still preserve the liberal vision of a norm-based legal system. Franz Neumann and Otto Kirchheimer, in an age dominated by Hitler and Stalin, sought to establish a sound theoretical basis for the "rule of law" ideal. As an outcome of their sophisticated understanding of the liberal political tradition, their writings suggest a theoretical missed opportunity, an alternative critical theory that might usefully be applied in understanding (and perhaps countering) the contemporary trend toward the deformalization of law.
William E. Scheuerman
William E. Scheuerman is Assistant Professor of Political Science at the University of Pittsburgh. He is author of Between the Norm and Exception: The Frankfurt School and the Rule of Law (1994). Franz L. Neumann (1900–1954) was a labor lawyer and legal advisor to the German Social Democratic Party before emigrating to England and then the United States after Hitler's rise to power. He was Professor of Public Law at Columbia University at the time of his death. Otto Kirchheimer (1905–1965) was a lawyer and left-wing Social Democrat who defended Weimar Democracy during its waning hours. He fled to France and then the United States, where he taught at Wellesley, the New School, and Columbia University.
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