Stanley Fish on Philosophy, Politics and Law: How Fish Works

by Michael Robertson

Fish's writings on philosophy, politics and law comprise numerous books and articles produced over many decades. This book connects those dots in order to reveal the overall structure of his argument and to demonstrate how his work in politics and law flows logically from his philosophical stands on the nature of the self, epistemology and the role of theory. Michael Robertson considers Fish's political critiques of liberalism, critical theory, postmodernism and pragmatism before turning to his observations on political substance and political practice. The detailed analysis of Fish's jurisprudence explores his relationships to legal positivism, legal formalism, legal realism and critical legal studies, as well as his debate with Ronald Dworkin. Gaps and inconsistencies in Fish's arguments are fully explored, and the author provides a description of Fish's own positive account of law and deals with the charge that Fish is an indeterminacy theorist who undermines the rule of law.

366 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2014

About the author

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Reviews

[Jeff Samuelson · Rating 4 out of 5]

Fish’s anti-foundational based attack on Liberalism is very thought provoking. I agree with his principle of autonomy of practices. He believes philosophy has no consequences outside of its own study.