Hohfeld's analysis of jural relations: the eight fundamental legal conceptions
LUG-102 Jurisprudence — Legal Method, Indian Legal System and Basic Theory of Law, Unit IV: Rights and duties: theories and classification. · LLB · 60 min
Wesley Newcomb Hohfeld showed that the single word 'right' conceals four different legal relations, each with its own correlative and its own opposite: right-duty, privilege-no-right, power-liability and immunity-disability. This lecture builds the two tables of jural correlatives and jural opposites, gives an Indian example for every pair (a creditor's claim, the privilege of private defence under the BNS, the power to make an offer or a will, the immunity of the President under Article 361), explains the uses and the criticisms (Kocourek, Pound, Dias, Glanville Williams) and compares Hohfeld with Salmond. It answers the 'detailed chart' question of 2023-24 and the Hohfeld questions of 2022-23 and 2024-25.
Objectives
- Explain why Hohfeld thought the word 'right' ambiguous and what he meant by 'the lowest common denominators of the law'.
- Define each of the eight fundamental legal conceptions and reproduce the tables of correlatives and opposites from memory.
- Apply the scheme to Indian situations: a debt, self-defence, an offer, a will, Articles 13, 105 and 361.
- Distinguish a claim-right from a privilege, and a power from an immunity, in a given fact situation.
- Evaluate the scheme: its uses in clear thinking and drafting, and the criticisms of Kocourek, Pound and Dias.
Slides
- Why Hohfeld? The ambiguity of 'right'
- The eight conceptions in outline
- Pair 1: right (claim) and duty - the creditor and the debtor
- Pair 2: privilege (liberty) and no-right - self-defence and the freedoms of Article 19
- Pair 3: power and liability - an offer, a will, a statute
- Pair 4: immunity and disability - Article 361 and the fundamental rights
- The two tables: jural correlatives and jural opposites, with an Indian example for each
- Using the scheme: ownership, trusts and drafting
- Criticism of Hohfeld
- Worked examples and the exam answer
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