Clare Huntington, Failure to Flourish: How Law Undermines Family Relationships, New York: Oxford University Press, 2014, 352 pp, hb, £29.99.
| Author | Chris Barton |
| Published date | 01 July 2015 |
| Date | 01 July 2015 |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1111/1468-2230.12138 |
As one might expect from a Festschrift, much of Revisiting Macaulay has a
retrospective, stocktaking feel. Some of the latest trends in social science –
particularly the ever-increasing influence of behavioural psychology – do not
loom large in this collection. And though the authors are unanimous in their belief
in the significance of empirical work, few of the papers present new empirical
research. That is hardly surprising: undertaking a new survey or statistical analysis
is time-consuming, and authors are more likely to choose more readily accessible
journals over edited collections as venues for such research. All the same, two of
the contributions do draw on original empirical work. Claire Hill analyses the
reasons for, and implications of, errors in contract drafting. Hill concludes with an
insight from Macaulay: because written contracts are not terribly important, we
should not be much concerned about mistakes in them. Li-Wen Lin and Josh
Whitford – both sociologists – analyse conflict and collaboration in the semicon-
ductor industry through the use of several datasets. They provide evidence that,
while parties to contractual alliances in the industry rarely sue one another,
litigation is significantly more common between parties who lack such a contrac-
tual relationship but have a business partner in common. Lin and Whitford’s paper
is the most difficult in Revisiting Macaulay for an ordinary legal scholar to digest, but
a close reading supports their claim that network analysis is likely to yield
significant insights into commerce, litigation, and contracts.
As Edward Rubin points out in his contribution, empirical work on law
involves a shift in perspective towards a systematic examination of the actual
effect of law on human behaviour (75–84). Rubin is hopeful that empiricism can
transform the legal system so that it is responsive to the needs of the modern
administrative state (85–92). Macaulay himself, being more tentative and cau-
tious, would probably shy away from this bold way of characterising the potential
of empirical work. Nevertheless, we may hope that Macaulay’s example will
continue to inspire the next generation of contract law scholars. The empirical
perspective does not provide a straightforward set of easy answers. But scholars
on all sides of the debates who hunger for a rounded picture of contractual life
as it is really lived will find plenty of nourishment in Revisiting Macaulay.
Paul MacMahon*
Clare Huntington,Failure to Flourish: How Law Undermines Family Rela-
tionships, New York: Oxford University Press, 2014, 352 pp, hb, £29.99.
This new book, written by Claire Huntington of Fordham University, promises
to tell us how the law undermines family relationships. Is this true of US law?
Might it be true here too? If the impact of those thanked by the author (ix-x)
for being, variously, ‘brilliant’, ‘extraordinary’, ‘inspirational’, ‘irreplaceable’,
*London School of Economics.
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© 2015 The Author. The Modern Law Review © 2015 The Modern Law Review Limited. 713(2015) 78(4) MLR 695–726
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