Revolution and evolution in private law

The development of private law across the common law world is typically portrayed as a series of incremental steps, each one delivered as a result of judges dealing with marginally different factual circumstances presented to them for determination.

This is said to be the common law method. According to this process, change might be assumed to be gradual, almost imperceptible.

If this were true, however, then even Darwinian-style evolution - death of the dinosaurs or development of flight - would seem unlikely in the law, and radical and revolutionary paradigms shifts perhaps impossible.

The essays in this volume explore some of the highlights in this fascinating revolutionary and evolutionary development of private law.