A precedent may be a guide to action, but decision-makers do not always accept the guidance. Moreover, expectations that decision-makers will accept the guidance tend to vary from one adjudicative system to the next. Such variance is obvious even among common-law jurisdictions: traditionally, for example, lower court judges in the United States have, for a variety of reasons, been far more willing than have their English counterparts not to follow a precedent, even when it is not within their power to overrule it. When judges seem quite comfortable declining to heed precedent, it is no surprise to find legal theorists arguing that stare decisis has little constraining power. That judges often will not follow, and will be entirely within their rights not following, precedents can make it seem odd (even if not technically incorrect) to talk of a doctrine of binding precedent. It would be a mistake, nevertheless, to think that the judicial capacity to act appropriately by not following a precedent necessitates the conclusion that precedents are a weak form of authority. Just as judges might be acting appropriately, so too they might be acting inappropriately, in not following a precedent: the precedent, that is, might be soundly decided and on all fours with the case at hand, so that there is no good reason for a court to avoid following it. A precedent might inhibit, furthermore, even where it is not followed.