The Ten Legal Cases That Made Modern Britain

LIFE. SEX. RACE. POWER. FREE SPEECH. PROTEST. PRIVACY. DEMOCRACY. SOVEREIGNTY. DEATH. Society shapes law... and law shapes society. We like to imagine that progress comes about when Parliament spots a looming groundswell in public opinion and responds by changing the laws that govern our daily lives. This is not always true. In this fascinating book, Inigo Bing unravels ten legal cases in which the decisions of judges or a jury either heralded a shift in outlook or forced Parliament to respond to simmering social change. Some of these cases demonstrate the role judges have in defending our civil liberties against overweening executive power, articulating inherent unwritten rights Parliament would prefer to keep quiet about. Others explore what happens when rapid technological or social change outpaces government, placing urgent ethical dilemmas in the lap of the court. All of them have had a lasting impact on the society we inhabit. Taken together, these stories provide a powerful insight into eighty years of British social, political and cultural history, illustrating why legal cases are just as important to making our world as laws written by Parliament or grassroots changes within society.

Inigo Bing has spent a lifetime in the law, first as a barrister and then as a judge. He studied law at the University of Birmingham and later undertook postgraduate study in history at Birkbeck, University of London. During the 1970s and 1980s, he was active in politics, first in the Labour Party and then in the SDP, and his political outlook informs the ideas presented in this book. He is a Bencher of the Inner Temple and the author of Populism on Trial: What Happens When Trust in Law Breaks Down.