Author Description

This book demonstrates that blind faith in the law as a beneficent agent of social change is misplaced. Thornton argues that not only does the liberal commitment to individualism undermine the communal or class-based nature of discrimination, but the legal culture itself operates to uphold the power of social superordinates. She goes on to show how such a subversive result can be achieved through the application of the ostensibly neutral principles of legal doctrine. The results drawn from the Australian experience are likely to be similar to that found in the United States, Canada, and the United Kingdom.