There are two golden rules for the citation of legal authorities. One is consistency. The other is consideration for the reader. Legal writing is more persuasive when the author refers to legal materials in a clear, consistent and familiar way. The Oxford University Standard for Citation of Legal Authorities (OSCOLA) helps authors to achieve consistency in citing cases, legislation and secondary sources. And it helps authors to make life easier for their readers.
OSCOLA is widely used by law schools and legal publishers both in the United Kingdom and abroad. This latest revision of OSCOLA (the fourth edition) is the first to be published in hard copy, and provides more detailed coverage of both primary and secondary legal sources.
The editors are Donal Nolan and Sandra Meredith.
Shortlisted for the Halsbury Legal Awards 2013 in the Award for Academic Contribution category.
Introduction
1 General notes
1.1 Citations and footnotes
1.2 Subsequent citations, cross-references and Latin 'gadgets'
1.3 Punctuation, ranges of numbers and years, and foreign words
1.4 Citing foreign materials
1.5 Quotation
1.6 Tables and lists of abbreviation
1.7 Bibliographies
2 Primary Sources
2.1 Cases from England and Wales
2.2 Cases from Scotland
2.3 Cases from Northern Ireland
2.4 UK primary legislation
2.5 UK secondary legislation
2.6 European Union legal sources
2.7 The European Court of Human Rights
2.8 Cases and legislation from other jurisdictions
3 Secondary sources
3.1 General principles
3.2 Books
3.3 Articles
3.4 Other secondary sources
4 Appendix
4.1 Guide to neutral citations
4.2 Abbreviations
4.3 Guides for other jurisdictions
4.4 Other useful sources
Oscola Quick Reference Guide
