The Uses of Law to Sociology.

The article aims to discuss some of the contributions which the study of law has made to sociology and to argue that sociology has much to gain from an examination of the relationship between law and society. As a preliminary, it must be recognized that the value of law to sociology does not lie in treating it as an independent variable capable of providing causal explanations of other social phenomena. This becomes evident, for example, in the work of sociologist Max Weber. One of Weber's paramount concerns was to account for the rise of capitalism, uniquely, in the Western world. To this end, he undertook to study the peculiar features of Western society associated with the advent of Western capitalism. Protestantism was one such feature which, he argued, was conducive to the "spirit" of capitalism. Another was the rational and predictable legal system which made possible the forward planning and rational calculation of risks essential to capitalist enterprise. The main task which Weber undertakes in his sociology of law is to specify more precisely the causal relationship between Western law and the rise of capitalism.