Home | Databases | WorldLII | Search | Feedback Edited Legal Collections Data

Senn, Peter R. --- "Social science as a source of the law" [1999] ELECD 27; in Backhaus, G. Jürgen (ed), "The Elgar Companion to Law and Economics" (Edward Elgar Publishing, 1999)

Book Title: The Elgar Companion to Law and Economics

Editor(s): Backhaus, G. Jürgen

Publisher: Edward Elgar Publishing

ISBN (hard cover): 9781858985169

Section: Chapter 20

Section Title: Social science as a source of the law

Author(s): Senn, Peter R.

Number of pages: 11

Extract:

20 Social science as a source of the law
Peter R. Senn


The social sciences are, and long have been, a source of the law. The proc-
esses involved are unlike those of the sciences that study things or animals.
Many of the same qualities that separate the different sciences lie behind the
differences in processes. The most important of these scientific differences
stem from their subjects and, secondarily, their methods. The roles of tech-
nology, indeed its definition, are special for each kind of science.
Social science studies human interactions. The other sciences study things
or animals. For these sciences, the ultimate test of truth comes from the
technology which is developed from the knowledge the science provides. If
the knowledge can be shown to work, it is judged to be correct. If the
knowledge does not survive empirical verification, something about it is
thought to be lacking. The case is very different for the study of mankind.
There is no ultimate test of truth. The time, the place, the circumstances and,
above all, man's free will determine the outcome of events. Knowledge that
stands up to empirical verification in one situation does not do so in another.
Social scientific knowledge is contingent in ways that the knowledge of
things is not. Even cultural universals, such as music and exchange, change
with time and are socially conditioned. Few social science generalizations are
verifiable for all times and all cultures. Those that are universally true, such
as `all men ...