This chapter discusses the role of certainty in questions of trust and power in property management. For an obligation to be legally enforceable, it must be defined with sufficient certainty to allow the courts to control it, and a power conferring authority can only be exercised within the limits subject to which it is created. This range of different types of obligation has implications for the applicable tests for certainty. The court must know who is under an obligation, what the obligation is, to what property the obligation relates, and who can enforce the obligation. In the case of a power, the court needs to know who can exercise the power, how it can be exercised, and whether the power has been validly exercised.
Chapter
5. Certainty
Chapter
8. Cop cultures
Benjamin Bowling, Robert Reiner, and James Sheptycki
This chapter critically examines the concept of cop culture, that is, the world view and perspectives of police officers. It considers the core characteristics of police culture portrayed in empirical studies at many different places and times, relating them to the danger and authority associated with the police role. It then discusses the themes of mission, hedonistic love of action, and pessimistic cynicism that characterize policework and how they relate to other facets of cop culture such as suspicion, isolation/solidarity, and conservatism. Finally, it analyses variations in cop culture and in organizational culture. The fundamental argument is that the structural features of the police role in liberal democratic societies generate tensions and the cultural perspectives that enable police to cope with them, although these have negative features reflecting the fundamental patterns of social injustice and inequality.
Chapter
5. The authority of the agent
This chapter explores the authority of the agent. It tackles the interplay of authority between an agent, a principal, and third parties, and the distinction between actual and apparent authorities. In most cases of apparent authority, the ‘principal’ makes a representation that the ‘agent’ has authority which the third party relies upon by entering into a contract. In certain circumstances, a person who acts in an emergency to preserve the property or interests of another may be treated as an agent of necessity regardless of the principal's absent consent. The chapter then overviews the impact of ratification on the rights and liabilities of third parties.
Chapter
8. Corporate Liability: Contracts, Torts, and Crimes
The Concentrate Questions and Answers series offers the best preparation for tackling exam questions and coursework. Each book includes typical questions, suggested answers with commentary, illustrative diagrams, guidance on how to develop your answer, suggestions for further reading, and advice on exams and coursework. This chapter examines company contracts including: pre-incorporation contracts, the company’s capacity, directors’ authority, and restrictions on the powers of directors to bind the company. The chapter also considers liability of the company for tortious and criminal acts, including vicarious liability; attribution; and the particular area of corporate manslaughter and the Corporate Manslaughter and Corporate Homicide Act 2007.
Chapter
5. Creation of agency, and the authority of the agent
D Fox, RJC Munday, B Soyer, AM Tettenborn, and PG Turner
This chapter focuses on the creation of the principal–agent relationship and the authority of the agency and the four ways of creating it: through an express or implied agreement between the principal and the agent; under the doctrine of apparent authority; by operation of law; and through ratification of an unauthorised agent’s acts by the principal. Agency arising out of agreement will always be consensual, but it need not be contractual. After explaining how the agency relationship is created, the chapter examines the authority of the agent such as actual authority, apparent authority, and usual authority.
Chapter
1. Aims, themes, and structure
This chapter sets out the basic aims, themes, and structure of this book which are to provide an introductory account of the English legal system, to note how it has developed in recent years, and to consider how it may develop in future. Part II raises fundamental issues about the social functions of law and the legitimacy of law; and considers the institutional framework within which law is made. Part III looks at the different contexts in which law is developed and practised. Part IV looks at the provision and funding of legal services. Finally, Part V offers reflexions on a system in flux.
