Beyond the Law

Abstract

Previous articleNext article FreeEditors’ NoteBeyond the LawRoger Karapin and Leonard FeldmanRoger KarapinEditor-in-Chief Search for more articles by this author and Leonard FeldmanAssociate Editor for Political Theory Search for more articles by this author Editor-in-ChiefAssociate Editor for Political TheoryPDFPDF PLUSFull Text Add to favoritesDownload CitationTrack CitationsPermissionsReprints Share onFacebookTwitterLinked InRedditEmailQR Code SectionsMoreWhile activities “beyond the law” can refer to the flouting of legal strictures, this phrase also can refer to the context in which the law operates, the slippage between what the law specifies and what actually happens, or social and political life that is not regulated by the law at all. Political agents—from power-hungry executives to civilly disobedient citizens—mark the limits of the law as they attempt to go beyond it, sometimes in the name of a higher moral principle, sometimes with reference to a gap within law, and sometimes on the basis of a supposedly more fundamental authority. The beyond of law can indicate a temporal future or a spatial outside. If law is like a hedge, as political theorists such as Hobbes and Locke claim, it is only natural to inquire what exists on the other side of it.In this issue, Regine Spector’s “Property, Lawfare, and the Politics of Hope in Weak States” uses a detailed case study to argue that in the post-Soviet context of Krygrzstan, when legal rulings are not implemented (showing that some property rights are beyond the law), claimants may persist in the hope that political change will lead to future implementation.1 Next, Martin Caver, in “A Different Price for the Ticket: Hannah Arendt and James Baldwin on Love and Politics,” suggests that James Baldwin helps us move beyond Hannah Arendt’s focus on constitutional reforms to consider the transformations in feeling and imagination required to realize racial justice.2 Ross Bellaby’s “Too Many Secrets? When Should the Intelligence Community be Allowed to Keep Secrets?” examines the tendency of existing political and legal institutions to promote excessive intelligence secrecy.3 He advocates moving beyond democratic theory and constitutional checks and balances to a new conceptual framework based on just war principles and creating a new oversight body of experts and public representatives. John Grove’s article, “The Federalist on the Public Will,” contrasts Hamilton’s and Madison’s sources and remedies for the problems of faction, through executive leadership and legislative restraint.4 In contrast to this issue’s other articles, Robert Boatright’s “Retrenchment of Reform?” dives deep into the law, namely the specialized laws that govern primary elections in the United States, cataloguing changes made in the mid-twentieth century and assessing explanations for them.5 Finally, Lance Gore’s “The Communist Party-Dominated Governance Model of China” describes that model in detail while arguing that, although China does not have a well developed rule of law or democratic institutions, its governance system has achieved a degree of legitimacy and accountability as well as strong, sustained economic growth.6 Notes 1. Regine A. Spector, “Property, Lawfare, and the Politics of Hope in Weak States,” Polity 51 (2019): 3–34.2. Martin Caver, “A Different Price for the Ticket: Hannah Arendt and James Baldwin on Love and Politics,” Polity 51 (2019): 35–61.3. Ross W. Bellaby, “Too Many Secrets? When Should the Intelligence Community be Allowed to Keep Secrets?” Polity 51 (2019): 62–94.4. John G. Grove, “The Federalist on the Public Will,” Polity 51 (2019): 95–125.5. Robert G. Boatright, “Retrenchment or Reform?” Polity 51 (2019): 126–60.6. Lance L. P. Gore, “The Communist Party-Dominated Governance Model of China,” Polity 51 (2019): 161–94. Previous articleNext article DetailsFiguresReferencesCited by Polity Volume 51, Number 1January 2019Beyond the Law The Journal of the Northeastern Political Science Association Article DOIhttps://doi.org/10.1086/701142HistoryPublished online November 09, 2018 © 2018 Northeastern Political Science Association. All rights reserved.PDF download Crossref reports no articles citing this article.