On Debunking Labor Law Doctrine: A Review of James Atleson's Values and Assumptions in American Labor Law

Among the time honored traditions of academic lawyers is the debunking tradition. Legal doctrine, in the hands of devotees of that tradition, is "demystified," "deconstructed" or simply "trashed," most often by exposing the "real" as distinguished from the judicially stated functions of particular legal rules. Until recently, the legal realists could be said to have produced the best (and most caustic) examples of the debunking art. However, "critical legal studies" scholars currently are mounting a substantial challenge to that title. Labor law doctrine has become a favored target of criticism by those scholars.