Suicide and the Law

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Description

This book investigates the laws approach to suicide in England and Wales. It explores the seismic shift in perceptions of the laws role in respect of suicide from imprisonment as a punishment for attempting suicide, to courts hearing arguments about whether there is not only a right to suicide but also a right to assistance in suicide. This development stands alongside a global recognition of suicide prevention as a public health priority. In this book, the dual priorities of respect for autonomy and the protection of human life are recognised as equally important and the legal issues surrounding suicide in a range of different contemporary contexts, including suicide in prison and juvenile suicide, are considered. The book also investigates what the relationship between mental health and suicide means for its legal regulation, and evaluates the enduring legal offence of assisted suicide, particularly in the context of the terminally ill. It is argued that a more refined approach to the topic of voluntary death should be recognised in the law; one that distinguishes more clearly between autonomous decision-making about the end of life, and incapacitated self-caused risks to life that require effective preventative interventions.

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The book is a stimulating and elegantly written work, covering a very wide range within a relatively short compass it will challenge practising lawyers who have any involvement in these areas, and will hopefully also make its way before the Health and Social Care Select Committee of the Westminster Parliament as it grapples at the moment with its inquiry into assisted dying / assisted suicide. -- Alex Ruck Keene * Mental Capacity Law and Policy Blog *

Author Bio

Elizabeth Wicks is Professor of Human Rights Law at Leicester Law School, UK.