ABSTRACT
In this chapter, the author argues that the choice between the competing visions depends on the resolution in theory and practice of a central tension in the understanding of class implicit in sociological jurisprudence and in much contemporary legal scholarship. The author proposes to review some of the problems emphasized in the critique and to focus on a few that seem especially pertinent to the recent history of the welfare system. The profession plays the role in the opposed vision that the aristocracy played in classical political theory and the civil service played in Hegel's political theory; it mediates between legality and society. Although explicit reference to class is considered vulgar in legal professional circles, a vague but important set of assumptions about class lies beneath the surface of most contemporary public law discourse. The political approach interprets the dominant vision as ideology.
