ABSTRACT
This chapter addresses the question of whether Foucault's stimulating and original account of the place of law in modern society excludes or marginalizes the role played by the expansion and diversification of legal mechanisms in constituting modernity. I have addressed related questions previously (Hunt 1992; Hunt and Wickham 1994). My reason for revisiting these issues is that, as my title suggests, what now seems an important dimension of Foucault's discussion, namely the nature and role of the ‘juridical’, did not receive the attention it deserves. This was largely because his important series of lectures, entitled ‘Truth and Juridical Forms’ and delivered in Rio de Janeiro in 1973, did not become available in English until 2000 (Foucault 2000). In these lectures, he sets out to outline some working hypotheses ‘with a view to a future work’ (2000: 1). As was often the case with Foucault's fertile mind, he never pursued this project. I wish to make it clear that I make no pretence of undertaking his unrealized project.
