The Study On Black's Pure Sociological Theory Of Law

In the 1970s, a new theory, pure sociology of law, which was established by Donald Black, followed the example of physical science and tried to construct a widely applicable paradigm in the words and ways of geometry. The goal could be a general theory capable of predicting and explaining legal behavior of every kind. This legal theory focuses on the behavior of law in the true life, discussing the relativity between the social structure and law from social heterogeneity based on the location of actor, distance of relationship and the direction of action, tracing the track of the two variables——the quantity of law and the style of law, drawing the outline of the behavior of law in the coordinate of social space. Such theory only addresses legal reality alone and passes over in silence all matters of a critical nature.The relationship between law and social heterogeneity is analyzed deeply by pure sociological theory of law. Its special research angle and method are conducive to know the social nature of law that can't depart from the law itself except in the ways of logic analysis of legal rules and metaphysical research. It challenges conventional thinking about the sociological research of law and offers a new understanding of legal life. Its scientific method tries hard to eliminate the psychological factors in the research process, which is quite different from the former ways that mainly analyze the values, functions, interests or rules. However, the pure sociological theory of law also exposes its puzzle in pursuing the scientific goal.By discussing Black's theory, we can view the law from a new angle and find many factors which affect law in social life. This paper will analyze the subject matter of pure sociological theory of law and its method, review its source, generalize its main idea and discuss the gains and losses of its scientific method in the sociological research of law.