Keith Hawkins is Reader in Law and Society, and Fellow and Tutor in Law at Oriel College, Oxford
"`This is an excellent ""interpretive"" socio-legal study of the prosecutorial decision-making by the officers in the British Health and Safety Executive ... the book does draw conclusions about how legal officials actually make decisions, and these insights will be of great interest to policy makers.' Regulation at Work `Law as Last Resort is Hawkins' magnum opus ... a broad scoped, definitive work on the process of law, from its everyday instrumental and expressive purposes, to its symbolic and dramatic uses. He has produced a work of serious scholarship and significant practical implications. Hawkins's dedication to studying decision making in its natural setting has revealed intricacies of law and regulation heretofore unavailable.' Diane Vaughan, Professor of Sociology, Boston College"