Compare critically Bentham's, Hart's and Dworkin's accounts of legal obligation. The essay is submitted for the course "Jurisprudence"

Legal obligation is both Bentham's and Hart's central concern. Yet, Dworkin does not really make an account on this topic, but rather criticising positivist theses. Thus, I will first make a brief summary of Bentham's and Hart's account of legal obligation, before I make a comparison of all the three jurists' theories. Jeremy Bentham's Legal Obligation For Bentham, obligation is the opposite of rights. Obligations and rights are the two classes of things that the …

…amp; Sons, 1985) Dworkin, Ronald, Law's Empire (Oxford: Hart Publishing, 1998) Dworkin, Ronald, Taking Rights Seriously (London: Duckworth, 1977) Hart, H.L.A., The Concept of Law (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1961) Bentham, Jeremy, Jeremy's Labyrinth: A Bentham Hypertext (http://www.la.utexas.edu/research/poltheory/bentham/), from Classical Utilitarianism Website (http://www.la.utexas.edu/cuws/index.html) (University of Texas at Austin). All Bentham's works cited in this essay, unless otherwise stated, are taken from this website.