Towards a Jurisprudence of Emergency: Colonialism and the Rule of Law

Author: Hussain N.

Source: Law and Critique, Volume 10, Number 2, 1999 , pp. 93-115(23)

Publisher: Springer

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Abstract:

This article revisits an infamous incident in colonial India -- the Amritsar massacre of 1919 -- in order to explore larger questions of the place of martial law and emergency in jurisprudence. By focusing on modes of power in the colonial realm, and the productive role of the colonies in the conception of modern law, it tests the claims of a rule of law and declarations of emergency. The argument tries to show how these two terms are, in fact, relational in theories of colonial discourse and of legal positivism. As such, it reads H.L.A. Hart's, The Concept of Law and instances from the colonial archive against one another.

Keywords: Amritsar massacre; British empire; colonialism; emergency; Hart; India; legal positivism; rule of law

Language: English

Document Type: Regular paper

Affiliations: 1: Department of Law Jurisprudence and Social Thought and Department of History, Amherst College, P.O. Box 5000, Amherst, MA 01002, USA nhussain@amherst.edu

Publication date: 1999-01-01