Simple Rules for a Complex World

by Richard A. Epstein

Book Overview

Too many laws, too many lawyers--that's the necessary consequence of a complex society, or so conventional wisdom has it. Countless pundits insist that any call for legal simplification smacks of nostalgia, sentimentality, or naivet?. But the conventional view, the noted legal scholar Richard Epstein tells us, has it exactly backward. The richer texture of modern society allows for more individual freedom and choice. And it allows us to organize...

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0674808215
• ISBN13: 9780674808218
• Release Date: March 1995
• Publisher: Harvard University Press
• Length: 378 Pages
• Weight: 1.12 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.9" x 5.8" x 8.8"

Customer Reviews

Complex

A quick aside: it's evident to me that I'm displaying some partiality in my rating of political books: libertarian books are netting higher scores than conservative and liberal fare (that being said, I've also overcompensated on some non-libertarian books that in retrospect are closer to trash than I originally thought). Readers of a different political persuasion may do well to add or subtract a star accordingly. That being said, Simple Rules is a fine book. The thesis, that we can govern the world with much easier legal structures than currently exist, is harmless enough and non-controversial enough, and the author elaborates on it well. The rules produced are--unsurprisingly--a legal code to make libertarians savor; nonetheless, Epstein's arguments are aimed at a wider audience than his fan base. We are seeing a more mature Epstein here: indeed, in an early chapters he mentions how he has come to peace with the idea of utilitarian justifications for rights, the typical libertarian rite of passage. Accordingly, his arguments here are of that vein: broad and utilitarian, appealing to shared values, written in a commonsensical, albeit dense, manner. Professor Epstein, as usual, doesn't coddle his readers. Sometimes the economic arguments (which in themselves show a lovely enrichment of his own thought) will slow one down or force rereading. Occasionally we flail, unable to grasp what the author's trying to get across. The pure number of arguments summoned gives the reader pause. But mostly the picture is clear--it just takes a little work to bring it into focus. Epstein's tone is often lax, informal, but not excessively so. Lawyer speak is made accessible. The first few chapters describe the theoretical virtues of simplicity, and the groundwork for developing a legal system. Each succeeding chapter centers on a particular rule, starting with some Lockean postulates and ending with corporate law, product liability, and others. Epstein bolsters his position with footnotes and flurries of arguments. The most satisfying section is the last, when the professor challenges his opposition, notably Ronald Dworkin. I suppose I would have liked more theoretical investigation--so much of the book is experiential pragmatism (which is also its charm), I would have liked to push Epstein further into theory. What is complexity? Why do laws become complex? What is a working definition for simplicity? Professor Epstein is certainly up to the task. Regardless, the main criticism I'll level is a typical anarchist response to the minarchist. Epstein's unhappy with the current American legal code, so he critiques the product and proposes a better one. I agree with that critique, but the larger problem is that the legal institution is without the proper incentives: there is insufficient reward for the production of good law--ergo the bad law Epstein critiques. And I propose that what is needed is not primarily a better product (thoug

Cost-benefit analysis in defense of liberty?

Prof. Richard Epstein has written a brilliant book here. His thesis, at heart, is that the world operates more efficiently and productively when legal rules are "simple" than when they are complex.In order to elaborate this thesis, he spells out just what he means by "simple," proposes a handful of simple rules himself in various areas of law (property, contracts, torts), and shows how they play out in action (in, e.g., labor contracting, employment discrimination, and products liability). In each case he argues, with much success, that it just wouldn't be efficient to try to improve on the results provided by the "simple" rules.I especially recommend this book, and Epstein's work generally, to law students. Epstein's knowledge of the law is thorough and deep; One-Ls will find it useful to keep it handy for the whole year.So why only four stars? Partly because I think cost-benefit analysis is neither an adequate defense of liberty against the regulatory State nor an adequate foundation for law; and partly because Epstein's reliance on such analysis leads him toward (though he stops short of actually arriving at) positions I regard as non- or anti-libertarian.This review isn't the place to critique consequentialism; for a more or less standard and (I think) decisive critique, the reader is referred to W.D. Ross's _Foundations of Ethics_, which, after sixty-odd years, is still one of the most judicious works on ethics ever written. Suffice it to say that I think we can increase efficiency by pursuing justice, but not vice versa; consequentialism and its subspecies utilitarianism seem to me to be not so much ways of answering moral questions as of never raising them. The "maximization" of happiness is one ground of moral obligation, but not the only one. (And in general, I simply fail to understand recent libertarian interest in an ethical school founded by a man who regarded natural rights as "nonsense" and imprescriptible natural rights as "nonsense upon stilts.")More serious, from a libertarian point of view, is that Epstein comes within inches of allowing a positive role for antitrust law. Now, mind you, he doesn't _quite_ do so. Indeed he calls for the repeal of the Sherman Act and related legislation, and he opposes the use of government power to distinguish between "corporate combinations that increase market competition" (p. 125) from those that do otherwise. (Note that his understanding of "competition" is thoroughly Chicago-school, a point for which Austrian theorists have quite properly taken him to task.)Yet his only ground for this latter opposition is merely that government agencies can't _tell_ which are which. Some corporate mergers, he says, may actually increase efficiency. Well, what about those that don't? Is he opposed in principle to such "inefficient" mergers? Would it be okay if the government stepped in to kill a merger that _was_ clearly "inefficient" by Epstein's standards? Or does he think there would be something morally

a good book.

Professor Richard Epstein does a very convincing job in this book of articulating a legal system which is far more practical and comprehensible than the regime we currently enjoy. In the tradition of the law and economics approach, Epstein's major theme is that the administrative costs associated with so much contemporary and complex law far exceed any incremental benefit in the social incentive structures they create. Whether he is dicussing contracts, torts, products liablility, or anti-discrimination laws, Epstein makes an intellectual, yet common-sense case as to how they should be reformed, or, in the case of anti-discrimination laws, why they should be abandoned. Epstein makes no bones that the complexity of law, while driven in part by a legal system which benefits from such complexity, is also the product of sincere efforts by well-intentioned individuals to create a legal system that can produce an individually fair result in almost any set of circumstances. This is, perhaps, the biggest obstacle to the adoption of the legal principles outlined by Epstein in "Simple Rules" - a narcissism shared by so many judges and lawmakers which has always seemed to prevent them from fully coming to grips with their own limitations.

Brilliant

This book is a brilliant analysis and synthesis of legal doctrine. Well worth the price and the time.