Causation in the law
- 2nd ed.
- Oxford Clarendon Press 1985
- 516 p.
The second aim of the book was to evaluate the body of legal theory which may be designated 'causal minimalism'. According to this, genuine causal issues are of small importance in settling questions of legal responsibility. In most instances they are confined to the issue whether the harm would have occurred in the absence of the wrongful conduct, and even this factual-sounding question is often answered in a way which owes more to considerations of legal policy than to any genuine attempt to determine the facts of the case. It is true that courts appear to take seriously, as raising causal issues, such further questions as whether the defendant's conduct was the 'proximate cause' of the harm or whether the harm was 'too remote'. They speak as if these presented issues of fact suitable, in an appropriate case, for submission to a jury.