NCJ Number
141545
Journal
Behavioral Sciences and the Law Volume: 11 Issue: 1 Dated: (Winter 1993) Pages: 17-29
Date Published
1993
Length
13 pages
Annotation
This paper traces changes in the nature of legal scholarship and illustrates how therapeutic jurisprudence, the study of the role of the law as a therapeutic agent, reflects changing conceptions of the law and legal scholarship.
Abstract
It argues that therapeutic jurisprudence may be regarded as a mental health law counterpart to "New Public Law" scholarship, which asks legal scholars to be sensitive to insights and techniques from the social sciences. The discussion also demonstrates that questions asked by scholars in therapeutic jurisprudence closely parallel those asked by scholars in public law. Both bodies of scholarship work from the assumptions that the enhancement of society's welfare and the promotion of compliance with basic norms are achievable by governmental action. Among topics on which therapeutic jurisprudence scholarship has focused are the competence of patients to consent to voluntary hospitalization, the mental health professional's duty to warn third persons about dangers posed by the therapist's patient, the plea process related to sex offenders, and the conditional release of individuals acquitted due to the insanity defense. Footnotes (Author abstract modified)