The Marxist view of legislation as ideology risks, nevertheless, an unhelpful reductionism. Conceiving of law as ideological above all else in the Marxist sense can promote a crude and misguided understanding of the relation between energy and legality, where legislation serves only the pursuits of the highly effective and the place authorized guarantees are mere shams. Moreover, this can license a cynicism about the legislation that’s paradoxically contrary to the emancipatory aims of the unconventional politics that was the impetus for the critique of legislation as ideology in the first place. That is, radical critics threat dismissing altogether the possibility of authorized sources for remedying injustice. The view of law as ideology, even in its radical variants, would not deny the presence of the rule of law in the liberal legal order; indeed, the rule of legislation is often invoked as a paradigmatic instance of authorized ideology.

To illustrate, consider … Read More