Culver's anthology includes only the first two of the three sections of Hart's chapter, but we still will not be able to discuss all the ideas that Hart introduces. Our discussion will probably focus on the second group of ideas from section 1.

• In section 1, Hart often has Hans Kelsen in mind, adopting some of his ideas with modifications and criticizing others. Kelsen's "On the Basic Norm" includes, in one way or another, most of the key points for this discussion; but Hart also has in mind Kelsen's views about the relation between validity and effectiveness, which appear in the last paragraph of the first section of "Law, State and Justice in the Pure Theory of Law" (pp. 378-379).
  • One topic is the hierarchical structure of the law. The key ideas here are
    • the criteria for identifying the law (pp. 159f),
    • the difference between subordination and derivation (p. 160), and
    • the difference between a supreme criterion and an ultimate rule of recognition (pp. 163f).
  • A second topic is the distinction between internal and external statements as this applies
    • to judgments of validity (p. 161),
    • to the relation between efficacy and legal validity (pp. 161f), and
    • to the status of an ultimate rule of recognition (pp. 164-166).
• Section 2 has two main topics:
  • The first concerns the status of a constitution and addresses concerns about whether a rule of recognition is law (pp. 166f).
  • The second topic (which begins on p. 167) is a consideration of the conditions for the existence of a legal system. It is summarized at the end of the section (pp. 171).