Law and politics are deeply intertwined. Law is an essential tool of government action, an instrument with which government tries to influence society. Law is also the means by which government itself is structured, regulated, and controlled. It is no surprise, then, that law is an important prize in the political struggle and that law shapes how politics is conducted.

As serious thinking about and around law and politics continues to flourish and develop, this new title in Routledge’s Critical Concepts in Political Science series meets the need for an authoritative reference work to map and make sense of the subject’s vast literature, and the ongoing explosion in research output. Edited by a leading scholar in the field, Law and Politics is a four-volume collection of foundational and cutting-edge contributions.

The materials gathered in the first volume cover jurisprudence and constitutionalism. The assembled major works examine crucial questions such as: what is law? And: what purposes do constitutions serve? Volume II, meanwhile, focuses on how courts operate and how judges make their decisions, examining the judicial process from trial courts to appellate courts. The third volume addresses the relationship between law and society and assesses the intersection between the legal process and social actors, considering such issues as how ordinary people think about the law and how legal compliance works. The final volume in the collection considers law, courts, and politics from an international and comparative perspective, bringing together the best and most influential research on such topics as the foundations of judicial independence and the relationship between law and economic development.

With a full index, together with a comprehensive introduction, newly written by the editor, which places the collected material in its historical and intellectual context, Law and Politics is an essential work of reference. The collection will be particularly useful as an essential database allowing scattered and often fugitive material to be easily located. It will also be welcomed as a crucial tool permitting rapid access to less familiar—and sometimes overlooked—texts. For political scientists and lawyers, as well as those working in cognate disciplines, it is sure to be valued as a vital one-stop research and pedagogic resource.