Dmitrii Tonkov (MGIMO) has posted Scientific Populism in Realistic Jurisprudence on SSRN. Here is the abstract:
The author emphasizes that even in the case of the most radical ideas of legal realism, its proponents identify patterns and factors amenable to scientific understanding, leading, for example, the court to a particular decision. Critics’ labeling of certain anti-metaphysical ideas and slogans of realistic jurisprudence as “populist” is not accidental: the use of vivid images and metaphors, the appeal to pressing human problems, and the intellectual freedom of supporters (often in high positions) of legal realism, have created an aura of “academic troublemakers” around them. Despite the existing negative connotations, the author notes, the word “populism” itself evokes only an emotionally neutral connection with “the people” and with concern for the common good as the highest political goal. The paradox of societal development (in the form of increasing social tension between the “knowledge society” and the “academic elite”), linked to its own rationalization, is examined separately. According to the author, legal realists have taken an important step towards exploring the interaction of law with ordinary human life, demonstrating a desire to reform jurisprudence as a “science” based on constantly reexamined social facts. The inconsistency of the accusation of excessive “simplification” of legal phenomena addressed to realistic jurisprudence is presented, and the terms “scientific populism” and “legal populism” are analyzed: the latter is considered in the form of “judicial populism”, which correlates in the chapter with “judicial activism” and “judicial behavior style”. It is concluded that “populism” in legal scholarship is not an antithesis of fundamental research, but a necessity for realistic understanding of law.
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