In Praise of Politics

This year’s BBC Reith Lecturer is Jonathan Sumption, until recently one of England and Wales’s most senior judges, sitting in the UK’s Supreme Court. In his series Law and the Decline of Politics, he sets out his argument that the law has moved into the space once occupied by politics.

In his second of five lectures, recorded with an audience at Birmingham University, England, Sumption discusses state legitimacy and how democracy can be effective in accommodating political differences. But he says that politics has shied away from legislating. Sumption argues the resolution of political differences should be the job of politics not the law.

The Reith Lectures are presented and chaired by Anita Anand.