Drawing on Islamic teachings and principles, Islamic environmental law offers a distinct perspective and values that contribute to its practical implementation in Muslim countries. This chapter proposes that empowering local communities to assume responsibility for their environmental obligations can foster a bottom-up approach to compliance, thereby cultivating a stronger sense of environmental stewardship and social responsibility among community members. To promote such a bottom-up approach, it is crucial to recognize Islamic environmental law as an academic discipline and encourage its inclusion in academic discourse. This recognition will inspire scholars and practitioners to explore how Islamic principles can be translated into concrete actions and policies that advance sustainability and environmental well-being.

The right to water is a central theme in Islamic thought, emphasizing its status as a divine gift and a communal resource integral to human dignity, environmental stewardship, and social justice. This study explores the manifestation of this principle within Islamic-Iranian cities, examining both historical and contemporary perspectives on water management, conservation, and urban development. Grounded in Islamic teachings, including the Quran, Hadith, and Sharia law, the paper highlights key principles such as equity, sustainability, and the balance between human and environmental needs. The architectural and urban planning traditions of Islamic-Iranian cities, characterized by sophisticated water systems like qanats, cisterns, and public fountains, reflect the integration of faith, culture, and practicality in addressing water scarcity. By analyzing Islamic environmental theory and the framework of integrated water resource management, this study underscores the role of water as a cornerstone of sustainable urban living, advocating for the preservation of water resources as a moral and ecological obligation for future generations.

The study of law suggests that its performances, largely through the format of trials, take place behind the closed doors of courtrooms. Little of the exterior would seem to intrude upon its routines and, vice versa, little of what might constitute law’s performativity occurs outside of its bounded architectural habitat. Yet this has not always been the case. Numerous examples of outdoor performances provide a rich study into the siting of legal performance. The argument presented in this chapter is that it was initially the outside that provided the primary stage and staging of law. Asserting the presence of law across the various and remote parts of the realm required performances of its majesty on the very surface of the earth. It required acts heralding, inscribing and publicising common law as the law of the land and so it was the land that had to become the physical platform and the scene of its delivery. The evolution of common law depended upon the rudiments of landscape, on the plotting of the countryside, and on the elemental matter of the earth. Such features formed a stage on which the emergence of common law not only took place but was very much performed.

The introductory chapter presents an overview of the classical doctrine of civil war and discusses some of the reasons for studying them. It argues that some doctrine of civil war is an inevitable component of any international legal system. Observing how the doctrine of civil war that existed in the age of sail and steam has come to seem rather opaque and remote in the present day, this study aims to offer modern readers a valuable review of that past tradition and to help them remember how such a doctrine once came to be and what happened to it. At the same time, the purpose of the book is not to argue for a revival of or return to the classical law, but rather to better understand the aspirations and limitations of the law of past generations, which may not be too unlike those of our own times.

Quintilian suggests that law be learned in significant part a comicis, from the usages, customs and comedies of everyday life. Starting out from the theatrical and foundational form of a legal dialogue between sovereign and philosopher on pedagogy, the body, letters and images, this chapter examines the fabrication of common law in terms of what the barrister Blount coined as comediography (comœdiographus). In whirl and jig, lawyers and playwrights of comedies share a trajectory from conflict to resolution, disruption to decision, that provides a harmonious conclusion for the audience if not necessarily the actors.

This chapter and Chapter 9 offer a detailed reading of central arguments in The Human Condition. A striking fact about this study of the “active life” is the absence of any discussion of morality, apart from minimum obligations to keep promises and forgive unintended consequences of action. The chapter sets out the problem, and then offers a conjecture about what moved Arendt to neglect morality: her fear that moral constraints would handcuff human action, which in her view makes life meaningful. The following chapter analyzes that conjecture in depth. The remainder of this chapter sets the stage by examining central themes and vocabulary in The Human Condition. It explains what Arendt means by “human condition”, unpacks her concepts of labor, work, and action and the risks of confusing them, and explains why the human condition of natality (“unto us a child is born”) matters so crucially.

Alcohol and other drug use (AOD) use tends to hold a privileged position within legal decision-making (Seear, 2020; Flacks, 2023), and the criminal case of R v Taj (2018) was no exception. The defendant, who was – it was agreed by all parties – experiencing paranoia and psychosis, launched a violent attack on a man he suspected of being a terrorist. Mr Taj had been drinking on eve of the incident, and the night before that, but tests on the day found no trace of alcohol in his bloodstream. He was nevertheless unable to plead self-defence on the basis that he honestly believed there was a risk to life and limb because, successive courts argued, he was already at fault for drinking alcohol, which led to the psychotic thoughts. There were some significant and potentially far-reaching claims in the case, including that intoxication-related behaviour does not require the presence of alcohol in the body, and that psychosis can be caused by alcohol alone. This allowed the court to conclude that Mr Taj was wholly responsible for his actions and so could not claim excuse or mitigation.

The attraction of using artificial intelligence (AI) to support judicial decision-making in the administrative context is obvious, but the considerations used for judicial review of algorithmic decision-making (ADM) ought also to be applied to judicial use of ADM in order to ensure its fair and optimal use. This chapter focuses on the UK experience to argue that five factors should be considered: (1) the potential for a particular area to be technologically justiciable; (2) the definition of a fair procedure and the need to choose the model or form of automation to fit the particular purpose and context of the system; (3) the need for gisting, wherever it is important to provide contestability of the system; (4) the iterative adoption of technology at a macro level, with a proportionate right to individual-level accuracy at the micro level; and (5) the need for safeguards on the use of data from one area in another. The availability of these insights in public law has the capacity to inform our choices, not only in the administrative justice context, but also across the board.

In conversation with Peters’s Law as Performance, I suggest paying closer attention to dialogue as one central element of performance itself. In this contribution, I analyze the configuration of affective spaces based on the characteristics of dialogue in legal settings, from legislation to inquisitorial cases.

Judicial independence is an essential part of democracies, based on the division of powers, rule of law, and respect for fundamental rights. In its most simplified version, judicial independence relies on the freedom from (and resilience to) the external and internal influences and pressures that the courts as institutions and judges as justice professionals are constantly subject to. Introducing AI into the judicial system could impact the judicial independence from a wide spectrum of angles: judicial independence can be compromised and shaped by the AI systems, in particular if these systems have been developed by private sector and/or designed by legislative or executive powers. Furthermore, AI systems can do this in much less perceptible ways that are difficult to detect and complicated to prove, for instance through the experts that courts rely on when the case requires specific knowledge or expertise. This chapter focuses on identifying these threats and addressing them in a constructive and solution-oriented manner, without compromising the potential of AI for the justice system.

Pakistan is one of the few countries worldwide whose Constitution does not explicitly address the environment. The higher courts have filled the vacuum by turning to the constitutional right to dignity, which the Constitution says is ‘inviolable’, as the basis for improving environmental outcomes to water, sanitation, and a stable climate, to name a few. This paper hazards an explanation as to the judicial reasoning behind this development. It posits that Pakistan takes the idea of dignity under law so seriously as to embrace environmental matters. In recent years, the courts have increasingly recognised the links between environmental protection and the enjoyment of human rights, including in particular, the human right to dignity. This article maintains that this is a positive development. As a conceptual matter, attention to human dignity foregrounds the impacts on human beings of environmental decisions, including decisions that contribute towards addressing climate change issues. It requires courts to address the ways in which those decisions diminish the ability of people to manage their own lives, often in ways that disproportionately affect those who are already the most vulnerable and marginalised.

“Common sense” has multiple meanings, some of them familiar and others less so. This chapter pursues the themes of Chapter 6 by disentangling five meanings of common sense and examining how Arendt uses them in her own epistemology. Hers, I argue, is a version of social epistemology, in which the reliability of empirical knowledge turns not only on our own capacities but also on the comparison of our judgments with those of others. Even though Arendt was deeply concerned about skepticism and the collapse of common sense, and occasionally wrote about the philosophical problem of radical skepticism, this chapter argues that she ultimately rejects the problem rather than attempting to solve it.

The element of duty of care is covered in three sections. Section 11.1 covers the role and nature of duty – what it is there for and what it covers. Section 11.2 deals with the law on the established categories of negligence (duties and immunities). Section 11.3 discusses the methodology of negligence in cases involving novel fact scenarios, where a duty is not pre-established and needs to be developed from scratch.

Because of the complexity of this area of the law, this chapter introduces a new ‘Summary points’ feature at the ends of sections 11.1 and 11.3. It summarises the matters you should take into account when approaching a problem question and asks you to engage in an active reading exercise, linking each point with a case in that section.