The inference to the best legal explanation

Courts use inferences to the best explanation in many contexts and for a variety of purposes. Yet our understanding of lawyers’ uses of this inferential form is insufficient. In this article, after briefly introducing this inferential form, I set out (i) to explain the structure of such arguments by reference to an argument scheme; (ii) to clarify the types of claims courts support by deploying such inferences while attempting to justify acting in accordance with explanatory principles (inferences I shall refer to as IBE-P); (iii) to offer an account of the “explanatory” relationship on which IBE-P is predicated; (iv) to explain what precisely can count as part of the explanandum in an IBE-P and, finally (v) discuss criteria that might be used to adjudicate which is the best among rival explanations.