The chapter suggests that Kant’s relational account of legal obligation enables us to push the boundaries of non-positivism beyond any established legal practices. The first part fleshes out the demands of a radical version of non-positivism whose main characteristic is that it regards legal practices as non-necessary grounds of the demands of external freedom (legal obligations). The second part focuses on the use of Kant’s Universal Principle of Right (UPR) to underpin radical non-positivism. It proposes a relational reading of UPR according to which the independence of persons, as the central demand of external or juridical freedom, cannot be understood outside the relations of interdependence into which they enter in social life. In conclusion, the proposed reading of Kantian right complements and reinforces a radical version of non-positivism which places centre stage pre-institutional relations as foundational ingredients of the external freedom of persons (relations-first non-positivism). The key claim of the chapter is that Kantian right supports a relations-first account of legal obligation.

As discussed in Chapter 1, the primary focus of this book is on the potential of neurotechnology to support the rehabilitation of convicted persons by improving risk assessment and risk management – rather than on its potential for diagnosing and treating mental or brain disorders. Still, in some cases, neurorehabilitation might well become conducive or even crucial to the improvement of mental health in forensic populations. Brain stimulation to attenuate aggressive impulses might serve to reduce the mental distress experienced by some persons subject to these impulses. Furthermore, aggression can be a symptom of a recognised mental illness, such as a psychotic disorder, or may be a core feature of a disorder, as in intermittent explosive disorder. Diminishing aggression using neurotechnology could in such cases be relevant to the person’s mental health, which appears to be an interest protected by human rights law. For example, Article 12 of the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (ICESCR) recognises a “right to the highest attainable standard of physical and mental health”.

Telework presents two quite distinct faces: longer, more irregular work schedules; yet potentially a better reconciliation of work and family life, provided it is promoted. Yet the outcomes are clearly ambivalent. Teleworking in itself is no guarantee of co-responsibility or the transformation of gender roles. There is a risk that it is perceived as the most ‘appropriate’ working arrangement for women, in a way that perpetuates gender roles and, even, widens the labour gap. To address this danger, socio-economic and cultural alliances, policies and regulations must all row in the same direction and take steps to eliminate patriarchal structures and systemic discrimination This contribution emphasizes that telework is not gender-neutral because it brings paid work into the domestic sphere, a traditionally feminine domain where productive and reproductive spaces overlap. The chapter analyses the impact that labour legislation and business practices have on women, and explores issues to which teleworking gives rise in relation to working time and work–life balance. Additionally, and with the focus more firmly on business practices, the work addresses the opportunities afforded by telework as a working-time arrangement.

This chapter frames the debate between those who think that Kant’s philosophy of Right is in some way independent from his moral philosophy and those who do not in two ways. First, the chapter argues that Kant recognizes only two forms of practical reason, namely the pure practical reason of morality and the empirical practical reason of prudential self-love, and that if his philosophy of Right is not to be a version of Hobbesian prudence, it can only be a part of morality – namely, the coercively enforceable part. It argues further that the moral foundation of Kant’s philosophy of Right is the innate right to freedom, itself the correlative of our obligation always to treat humanity as an end and never merely as a means, since humanity is equivalent to the ability of each to set his or her own ends, that is, freedom. In the second part of the chapter, it is argued that the duties of individuals and rulers alike to both institute and maintain the civil condition, namely the state, make sense only as moral and indeed ethical duties, although not duties of virtue to promote self-perfection and the happiness of others.

Miscarriages of justice encompass more injustice than wrongful convictions or proven innocence. Proven innocence is the most severe rationing of justice, but it is popular, especially for non-lawyers and in mass imprisonment societies such as China and the United States. Originally used as a rationale for compensation in the United States, it now also rations post-conviction relief. It has been used to ration compensation in England since 2014 but was rejected in the 2024 Canadian reforms, creating a Miscarriage of Justice Review Commission. Some Australian states have been attracted to it in recent legislation, but the Chamberlain and Folbigg wrongful convictions have properly been corrected because of reasonable doubts about the guilt of the two women. Following Ronald Dworkin, there needs to be greater concern about inequality in the distribution of the risks of injustice. The danger of wrongful conviction reforms providing justice for a few while legitimating injustices for many is most acute in authoritarian societies such as China, but not absent in democracies. Comparative law, legal process and historical analysis can contribute to richer understandings of miscarriages of justice. Two different future scenarios, one that provides justice for less and another that provides justice for more, are outlined.

Judge Frank Easterbrook once argued that rather than establish narrowly defined areas of legal research, scholars should stick to the study of general rules, which can be applied to any number of subject areas. The specific target in Judge Easterbrook’s crosshairs was cyberlaw, which was ascendant in the 1990s. His argument, and the metaphor within, is worth quoting at length: Lots of cases deal with sales of horses; others deal with people kicked by horses; still more deal with the licensing and racing of horses, or with the care veterinarians give to horses, or with prizes at horse shows. Any effort to collect these strands into a course on “The Law of the Horse” is doomed to be shallow and to miss unifying principles. Teaching 100 percent of the cases on people kicked by horses will not convey the law of torts very well. Far better for most students – better, even, for those who plan to go into the horse trade – to take courses in property, torts, commercial transactions, and the like, adding to the diet of horse cases a smattering of transactions in cucumbers, cats, coal, and cribs. Only by putting the law of the horse in the context of broader rules about commercial endeavors could one really understand the law about horses.

Remote work in Korea rapidly accelerated mainly with digitalization and covid-19, posing challenging issues for traditional labor law in this country. The practice of long working hours, and the crisis of the country’s low birth rate and aging population demand fundamental changes of working style. With the development of information and communication technology, traditional ways of direct command and supervision by employers seem to be reduced, while the discretion of workers expanded. However, technologies themselves also make possible more detailed direction by employers - even by the contractors of the employers. The character of the employment contract as a mutual contract presupposes fair distribution of obligation and responsibility. Changing situations surrounding working conditions such as remote work may encourage the re-distribution of responsibility. This chapter explores the impact of remote work on the employers’ responsibility from the standpoint of the response by Korean regulation and policies.