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Litigants in Person and the Family Justice System By JessicaMant, Oxford: Hart, 2022, 256 pp., £42.99 Journal of Law and Society (IF 1.431) Pub Date : 2024-03-16 JANE KRISHNADAS
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The Journal of Law and Society in context: a bibliometric analysis Journal of Law and Society (IF 1.431) Pub Date : 2024-03-12 CHRISTIAN BOULANGER, NAOMI CREUTZFELDT, JENNIFER HENDRY
On this, the occasion of its 50th anniversary, we employ a quantitative analysis of the Journal of Law and Society (JLS) to chart empirically the evolution of socio‐legal studies in the United Kingdom (UK). By tracing the influence(s) of the JLS upon the development of UK socio‐legal research, not only do we demonstrate a new mode of exploring knowledge production in the field of socio‐legal studies
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Key book in my education: Hegel's The Phenomenology of Spirit Journal of Law and Society (IF 1.431) Pub Date : 2024-03-05 MARIANA VALVERDE
This article is a contribution to the occasional series dealing with a major book that has influenced the author. Previous contributors include Stewart Macaulay, John Griffith, William Twining, Carol Harlow, Geoffrey Bindman, Harry Arthurs, André‐Jean Arnaud, Alan Hunt, Michael Adler, Lawrence O. Gostin, John P. Heinz, Roger Brownsword, Roger Cotterrell, Nicola Lacey, Carol J. Greenhouse, David Garland
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‘Executive robbery’: UK public law, race, and ‘regimes of dispossession’ in the Chagos Archipelago Journal of Law and Society (IF 1.431) Pub Date : 2024-03-05 TANZIL CHOWDHURY
This article explores the relationship between United Kingdom (UK) public law and ‘regimes of dispossession’, taking the Chagos Archipelago as its point of departure. This article argues that this instance of dispossession, typically understood as fortifying the military power of the United States, was also part of a wider geography of states dispossessing land for a specific set of economic purposes
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Law's Memories By MattHoward, Cham: Palgrave Macmillan, 2023, 164 pp., £99.99 Journal of Law and Society (IF 1.431) Pub Date : 2024-02-22 LUIGI CORRIAS
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Care on the move: the gender care gap and intra-EU mobility Journal of Law and Society (IF 1.431) Pub Date : 2023-12-14 NINA MILLER
The structure, interpretation, and implementation of the European Union (EU) free movement of persons rules mean that when one's circumstances involve caring responsibilities, the quality of one's rights and protections under EU law diminishes. The consequence of this, in the context of the gender care gap, is that women who are exercising their free movement rights and living in another EU member
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‘Would any of them have suffered from a guilty conscience if they had won?’: Rudolf Wiethölter and post-Second World War German law1 Journal of Law and Society (IF 1.431) Pub Date : 2023-12-13 DOMENICO SICILIANO
This article reads the theory of law of the Frankfurter jurist Rudolf Wiethölter as an ambitious attempt to realize through law the indispensable radical democratization of post-Second World War German society. The occasion was provided by the resurgence of critical theory and the subsequent and related emergence and affirmation of the student protest movement of 1968 at the Goethe University Frankfurt
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Five angry men: advocating for and mobilizing EU gender equality law to advance men's rights Journal of Law and Society (IF 1.431) Pub Date : 2023-12-03 SOPHIA AYADA
This article analyses the impact of a men's rights organization involved in political lobbying and legal mobilization around gender equality issues at the European level since 1986. Drawing on the as-yet unexplored archival materials of the Campaign for Equal State Pension Ages (CESPA), an organization that had a membership of about 1,200 individuals in the 1990s and later rebranded itself as PARITY
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Achieving compliance in the use of force: the production and maintenance of an imminent threat in an aerial targeting operation Journal of Law and Society (IF 1.431) Pub Date : 2023-11-30 ALEXANDER HOLDER
This article provides a socio-legal analysis of the ways in which military personnel orient to the laws of war as they seek to produce and maintain lawful targets for the use of force. In order to further empiricize debates surrounding the United States’ (US) controversial interpretations of core concepts in the laws of war, the article takes up the concept of ‘imminence’ – which is fundamental to
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The emotional labour of judges in jury trials Journal of Law and Society (IF 1.431) Pub Date : 2023-11-27 COLETTE BARRY, CHALEN WESTABY, MARK COEN, NIAMH HOWLIN
Judges are required to suppress and manage their own emotions as well as those of other court users and staff in their everyday work. Previous studies have examined the complex emotional labour undertaken by judges, but there is limited research on the emotion management performed by judges in their interactions with jurors. Drawing on a qualitative study of judge–jury relations in criminal trials
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The making of neoliberal legality: the legal imagination of business elites and the ‘social constitutionalization’ of ‘free enterprise’ in Latin America Journal of Law and Society (IF 1.431) Pub Date : 2023-11-13 RICARDO VALENZUELA, RODRIGO CORDERO
The ‘free enterprise’ system is a normative cornerstone of many Latin American political constitutions and a formative principle of neoliberal legality. However, the way in which this economic model shapes the legal field and conceptions of the rule of law remains understudied. Though lawyers, judges, and legal experts have played an important role in the legal buttressing of the free enterprise model
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‘Human rights cities’ in Africa? Rights as resources for urban governance in the Global South Journal of Law and Society (IF 1.431) Pub Date : 2023-10-29 MARIUS PIETERSE
This article considers the use of human rights law as a resource for urban governance by African cities, thereby supplementing the growing literature on ‘human rights cities’ that has thus far focused on the experiences of cities in the Global North. It considers the motivations for and impact of human rights city initiatives, before taking a closer look at reported instances of rights invocation in
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‘The rules are all over the place’: Mass Observation, time, and law in the COVID-19 pandemic Journal of Law and Society (IF 1.431) Pub Date : 2023-09-25 SIÂN BEYNON-JONES, EMILY GRABHAM, NADINE HENDRIE
This article analyses practices of pandemic time making that surrounded the imposition and communication of laws restricting daily life in parts of the United Kingdom in spring 2020. With colleagues, we commissioned a Mass Observation Project directive in summer 2020, asking contributors about their everyday experience of time during the COVID-19 pandemic. We analyse how legal temporalities emerge
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Global legal change from below and above Journal of Law and Society (IF 1.431) Pub Date : 2023-09-22 TERENCE C. HALLIDAY
This article is a contribution to the occasional series dealing with a major book that has influenced the author. Previous contributors include Stewart Macaulay, John Griffith, William Twining, Carol Harlow, Geoffrey Bindman, Harry Arthurs, André-Jean Arnaud, Alan Hunt, Michael Adler, Lawrence O. Gostin, John P. Heinz, Roger Brownsword, Roger Cotterrell, Nicola Lacey, Carol J. Greenhouse, David Garland
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Law, language, and the power of ‘invisible threats’ of violence against women Journal of Law and Society (IF 1.431) Pub Date : 2023-09-21 CATHERINE TURNER, AISLING SWAINE
Violence, and the threat of violence, is a pervasive feature of women's lives. From high-profile threats in politics to everyday harms such as domestic abuse, violence, threat, and intimidation control women's behaviour and silence their voices. Yet in many cases the pernicious and harmful effect of threat is not captured by the law. Drawing on the work of sociologist Pierre Bourdieu and empirical
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Epistemic othering: the interplay of knowledges in legislative drafting Journal of Law and Society (IF 1.431) Pub Date : 2023-09-20 KATI NIEMINEN, LAURA SARASOJA
In this article, we use the concept of epistemic othering to describe the subjectivation of people who experience debt problems in the legislative drafting process, and argue that the evidence-based policy paradigm, together with its participatory dimension, produce a potentially harmful subject position for people who are considered vulnerable and irrational. By analysing the preparatory material
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Introduction: Political constitutions in transnational society: introducing socio-legal and interdisciplinary perspectives Journal of Law and Society (IF 1.431) Pub Date : 2023-09-15 JIŘÍ PŘIBÁŇ
This Special Supplement of the Journal of Law and Society builds on the success of the Special Supplement Societal Constitutions in Transnational Legal Regimes, which was published in 2018 and focused on non-political societal constitutions and their transnationalization and globalization. This current volume revisits political constitutions and their recent societal evolution and transnationalization
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Transnational constitutionalism – conflicts-law constitutionalism – economic constitutionalism: the exemplary case of the European Union Journal of Law and Society (IF 1.431) Pub Date : 2023-09-07 CHRISTIAN JOERGES
Transnational constitutionalism is both a sociological given and a legal challenge. We observe the emergence of ever more legally framed transnational arrangements with ever more power and impact. Do such arrangements deserve to be called legitimate rule in Habermasian terms? Is it at all conceivable that the proprium of law can be defended against the rise of its informal competitors? This article
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Plurinational democracies in Europe: the quest for a profane constitutionalism Journal of Law and Society (IF 1.431) Pub Date : 2023-09-07 JOXERRAMON BENGOETXEA
How should we understand the claims on the right to decide on status made within plurinational member states of the European Union by actors and institutions seeking to protect the self-government of sub-state nations or peoples, or at least their right to consent to their ascribed status? Peaceful solutions to conflicts involving contested claims over territory, citizenship, and national sovereignty
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The economic constitution and the political constitution: seeking the common good in the post-national setting Journal of Law and Society (IF 1.431) Pub Date : 2023-09-04 MICHELLE EVERSON
In the post-national setting, the concept of the ‘economic constitution’ has been seen as design template and saviour; whether based on transactional certitude or founded on ordoliberal precepts, the economic constitution is assumed to legitimate economic integration across national borders in the absence of comprehensive political settlement. Nevertheless, recent tensions – not only within the European
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Coercion and justification: a global public reason perspective on Security Council reform Journal of Law and Society (IF 1.431) Pub Date : 2023-08-18 CARMEN E. PAVEL
The Security Council is the only international body capable of authorizing the use of force in cases other than self-defence. Its main mission is to protect international peace and security, and this has been reinterpreted in recent decades to include the protection of human rights in situations of grave humanitarian emergencies as well as to allow it to exercise legislative powers. Given this extraordinary
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Constitutionalism, populism, and the imaginary of the authentic polity: a socio-legal analysis of European public spheres and constitutional demoicratization Journal of Law and Society (IF 1.431) Pub Date : 2023-08-04 JIŘÍ PŘIBÁŇ
The sociology of constitutionalism emphasizes the duality of constitutions as both power limitations and power enhancements. Following the socio-legal perspective, this article focuses on the constitutional imaginary of the public sphere and distinguishes it from the imaginary of the authentic polity, in which the constituent power of the people is protected against the corrupting effect of representative
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Political constitutionalism in Europe revisited Journal of Law and Society (IF 1.431) Pub Date : 2023-08-03 MICHAEL A. WILKINSON
This article traces the disconnect in the constitutional study of the European Union from the Maastricht era to the euro crisis. In the Maastricht era, a discourse of ‘post-sovereignty’ came to dominate theoretical enquiry, reflecting but also distorting a number of material developments: the ‘end of history’, the retreat of critical theory into discourse analysis and systems theory, and the prioritization
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Democracy and emergency: finding the constitutional foundation of the knowledgeable state in social dynamics Journal of Law and Society (IF 1.431) Pub Date : 2023-07-28 MING-SUNG KUO
This article aims to bring to light the law–society dynamic relationship in constitutional governance by engaging with the question of political constitutionalism from the perspective of institutional epistemology. It first reframes the debate surrounding legal and political constitutionalism as one concerning the state's ‘epistemic competence’ in governance shaped by the constitution, and then traces
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Democratic representation and non-majoritarian actors in constitutional orders: a systemic analysis Journal of Law and Society (IF 1.431) Pub Date : 2023-07-24 CHIARA VALENTINI
A systemic analysis of constitutional democratic orders can shed light on two important aspects of political representation (PR): first, the complexity of PR as a plural endeavour involving various actors that perform different activities within a common framework; and second, the diachronic dimension of such an endeavour, which takes shape over time. The article elucidates both aspects with a focus
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‘No, buddy, I will not speak to the press – I am working!’: criminal justice and the interprofessional dynamics of communication production in the Chilean Public Prosecutorial Office Journal of Law and Society (IF 1.431) Pub Date : 2023-05-22 ISABEL ARRIAGADA, MARIANNE GONZÁLEZ LE SAUX, JAVIER WILENMANN, FELIPE ÁGUILA
This article analyses the interprofessional dynamics of communication production in the criminal justice system. Through 26 in-depth interviews, we investigate the production of media information on prosecutorial work in Chile, tracking the relationships between internal communication agents, prosecutors, and external legal journalists. Previous scholarship has shown the success of police organizations
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Indications of goal displacement induced by budget cuts and output management: a case study of a regulatory enforcement agency in the Netherlands Journal of Law and Society (IF 1.431) Pub Date : 2023-05-20 KEES HUIZINGA
A case study was conducted at a regulatory enforcement agency in the Netherlands to explore whether it might be affected by goal displacement and, if so, to gain insight into the possible causes of the phenomenon. The results indicate three distinct types of goal displacement, each of which appears to substantially impair the effectiveness of the agency in a specific way. It is argued that the combination
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Lawyers as infrastructures: mediations, blockages, and new possibilities in grassroots movements Journal of Law and Society (IF 1.431) Pub Date : 2023-05-19 HEBA M. KHALIL
What roles do lawyers play when their own subaltern communities are mobilizing for justice? Drawing on the case of anti-eviction mobilization on the island of Al-Warraq in Egypt, this article investigates the infrastructural roles of community lawyers in grassroots movements. As their profession transformed into an underpaid and undervalued occupation, masses of lawyers became precarious professionals
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Labour law after neoliberalism? Journal of Law and Society (IF 1.431) Pub Date : 2023-05-17 RUTH DUKES, WOLFGANG STREECK
Over the course of the past 40 years, neoliberalism has all but destroyed the institutions that once civilized labour markets. In the wake of that destruction, labour law reform is being driven in some jurisdictions by a new kind of right-wing populist politics. What does this hold in store for work relations? Our investigation of contemporary labour law begins with a brief look backwards to the pre-
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Epistemic emotions in prosecutorial decision making Journal of Law and Society (IF 1.431) Pub Date : 2023-05-17 NINA TÖRNQVIST, ÅSA WETTERGREN
The article examines epistemic emotions as part of the emotive-cognitive processes of prosecutors’ knowledge seeking and decision making in preliminary investigation and court proceedings. Drawing on ethnographic fieldwork, interviews, and shadowing of prosecutors in Sweden, we show how emotions motivate and orient prosecutors’ inquiries and the fundamental role of the ‘certainty–doubt spiral’ for
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The possible forms of professionalism: credibility and the performance of queer sexualities among barristers in England and Wales Journal of Law and Society (IF 1.431) Pub Date : 2023-03-10 MARC MASON, STEVEN VAUGHAN, BENJAMIN WEIL
This article constitutes the first account of sexual minority barristers’ experience of and relation to professionalism at the Bar. Drawing on survey and interview data, it presents the Bar as a site of heteronormativity, where masculinist heterosexuality is pervasively assumed and publicly valorized. The ‘credible’ barrister – authoritative, respected, competent – is constructed as heterosexual. In
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Human–algorithm hybrids as (quasi-)organizations? On the accountability of digital collective actors Journal of Law and Society (IF 1.431) Pub Date : 2023-03-10 ANNA BECKERS, GUNTHER TEUBNER
Models of individual accountability for algorithms’ actions fail when a human–algorithm association comes to be viewed as a collective actor. In some situations, human and algorithmic actions are so closely intertwined that there is no longer a linear connection between the emergent collectivity and the complex interactions of humans and algorithms. In such collective decision-making sequences, individual
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Disruptive accountability? Temporal regimes and social change in decolonization struggles in Belgium Journal of Law and Society (IF 1.431) Pub Date : 2023-03-06 TINE DESTROOPER
To address the legacies of colonialism, several former colonial states have implemented a range of initiatives commonly considered to belong to the domain of transitional justice (TJ). These contexts are, however, very different from those for which TJ was initially conceptualized. As such, the implementation of elements from the TJ toolbox in these decolonization struggles raises several questions
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The dynamic and iterative pre-dispute phase: the transformation from a justiciable problem into a legal dispute Journal of Law and Society (IF 1.431) Pub Date : 2023-03-06 ANNETTE OLESEN, OLE HAMMERSLEV
The pre-dispute phase, during which justiciable problems may or may not emerge and transform into legal cases, is complex. Based on a meta-ethnography of 572 articles, all of which apply or refer to Felstiner et al.’s pioneering linear framework of naming, blaming, and claiming, we analysed the many sorting mechanisms that are at play in the pre-dispute phase. We identified the institutional, political
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A duty to protect? Legal consciousness among military officers in armed conflict Journal of Law and Society (IF 1.431) Pub Date : 2023-02-20 SINE VORLAND HOLEN
Military personnel participating in international operations are often deployed to areas where armed groups inflict violence on civilians. In such instances, soldiers must decide how to respond, effectively becoming executors of the law. This article draws on legal consciousness theory and 33 interviews with Norwegian military officers to explore what soldiers perceive as the ‘law’ and how they make
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A socio-legal quest: from jurisprudence to sociology of law and back again Journal of Law and Society (IF 1.431) Pub Date : 2023-02-06 ROGER COTTERRELL
How should socio-legal studies view jurisprudence, the legal theory of jurists? Jurisprudence's task is to promote law as a socially valuable idea taking various forms in different times and places. As a value-oriented and context-focused enterprise, it should draw on the social sciences to make its inquiries relevant in a changing socio-legal world. Correspondingly, socio-legal research needs theory
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Political constitutionalism and populism Journal of Law and Society (IF 1.431) Pub Date : 2023-01-23 RICHARD BELLAMY
Criticisms of political constitutionalism's relationship to populism point in two opposed directions. Legal constitutionalists consider it too open to, and even as legitimating, populist politics, whereas radical democrats consider it too closed to popular participation, prompting an anti-system politics of a populist character. I dispute both these views. Underlying these contrasting assessments are
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Faces of hunger: an intersectional approach to children's right to food in the United Kingdom Journal of Law and Society (IF 1.431) Pub Date : 2022-12-08 KATIE MORRIS
This article explores the extent to which the right to food is currently enjoyed by children within the United Kingdom (UK) using image analysis of the food parcels received by children eligible for free school meals during the COVID-19 pandemic. It argues that child food poverty serves as an illustration of the failings of neoliberalism in the UK context, which had already been observed prior to the
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The counter-reparative impacts of South Africa's reparations gap: victims as reparations ‘experts’ and the role of victims’ organizations Journal of Law and Society (IF 1.431) Pub Date : 2022-12-08 AUGUSTINE S. J. PARK, MADALENA SANTOS
This article offers a victim-centric analysis of reparations relating to apartheid in South Africa. We identify a multi-dimensional ‘reparations gap’, which refers to the disconnect between victims and the state in relation to reparations, including the meanings attributed to reparations, and the perception, evaluation, and experience of reparations. The reparations gap has had profoundly ‘counter-reparative’
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Law and childbirth in Ireland after the 8th Amendment: notes on women's legal consciousness Journal of Law and Society (IF 1.431) Pub Date : 2022-12-07 MÁIRÉAD ENRIGHT, DEIRDRE DUFFY
Drawing on a survey of women's experiences of obstetric care in Ireland between 2000 and 2017, this article examines women's legal consciousness of the 8th Amendment; a fetal rights provision that formed part of the Irish Constitution until 2018. Though it was widely agreed that the Amendment had some influence on pregnancy and childbirth, even where the woman had not sought an abortion, the scope
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Justifying and practising effective participation in the Court of Protection: an empirical study* Journal of Law and Society (IF 1.431) Pub Date : 2022-12-02 CAMILLIA KONG, REBECCA STICKLER, PENNY COOPER, MATTHEW WATKINS, MICHAEL DUNN
Under the Mental Capacity Act 2005 in England and Wales (MCA), the participation of persons in making decisions that affect their lives is embedded within the legislation and has also been addressed directly in Court of Protection (CoP) rules and guidelines. Nonetheless, various studies and reports have indicated a potential gap between practice on the ground and the participatory aspirations of the
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What does gender equality need? Revisiting the formal and informal in feminist legal politics Journal of Law and Society (IF 1.431) Pub Date : 2022-11-30 DAVINA COOPER
This article explores the political conflict over reforming how sex and gender categories are used in British law, focusing on the speculative legal proposal to ‘decertify’ sex and gender. Three interconnected arguments are advanced. First, diverging views on decertification are both about and seek to marshal competing perspectives on the value and risks of formalization and its undoing. Second, understanding
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Redefining consent: rape law reform, reasonable belief, and communicative responsibility Journal of Law and Society (IF 1.431) Pub Date : 2022-11-29 EITHNE DOWDS
Contemporary trends in rape law reform have resulted in the adoption of more affirmative or communicative conceptions of sexual consent across many jurisdictions. Drawing on empirical research conducted by the author in the wake of the 2019 Gillen Review into serious sexual violence in Northern Ireland and proposed changes to the law on consent, this article illuminates the social and cultural norms
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Labour/data justice: a new framework for labour/regulatory datafication Journal of Law and Society (IF 1.431) Pub Date : 2022-11-25 DEIRDRE MCCANN, ARELY CRUZ-SANTIAGO
Labour datafication – the accelerating quantification of working life, encompassing data use that extracts additional value from workers – is increasingly recognized as a dimension of the future of work. This article proposes a notion of ‘labour/data justice’ to capture both the deterioration of working life at the labour/data nexus and datafied strategies for effective regulation. We examine ‘labour/regulatory
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The ‘legal’ in socio-legal history: Woods and Pirie v. Cumming Gordon Journal of Law and Society (IF 1.431) Pub Date : 2022-11-25 CAROLINE DERRY
This article explores the Scottish defamation case Woods and Pirie v. Cumming Gordon (1810–1812) in order to demonstrate the value of legal readings across the broadest spectrum of socio-legal history. While the case has attracted attention from social historians, particularly historians of sexuality, it was shrouded in secrecy and thus did not contribute to the development of legal doctrine. Nonetheless
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Doing Sociolegal Research in Design Mode, AMANDA PERRY-KESSARIS, London: Routledge, 2021, 154 pp., £44.99 Journal of Law and Society (IF 1.431) Pub Date : 2022-11-23 CLARE WILLIAMS
Think back to when you were starting out on your current research trajectory. How did you begin, and where? How did you identify your research question, your target audience, and your methodology? Was there an element of gut instinct? And have you revisited these questions since? While there are comprehensive methodology primers available for socio-legal researchers, none offer what Amanda Perry-Kessaris
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Continuities of exploitation: seasonal migrant workers in German agriculture during the COVID-19 pandemic Journal of Law and Society (IF 1.431) Pub Date : 2022-10-28 VLADIMIR BOGOESKI
Seasonal migrant agricultural workers were declared ‘essential’ in Germany at the very outset of the COVID-19 pandemic. Two harvest seasons later, continuing poor working conditions, infection outbreaks on farms, and a general exclusion from social security schemes show that the recognition of the ‘essential’ character of the job has not translated into any improvements for workers. Based on interviews
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Agency and vulnerability in the field of immigration law: a linguistic-ethnographic perspective on lawyer–client interaction Journal of Law and Society (IF 1.431) Pub Date : 2022-09-14 MARIE JACOBS, KATRIJN MARYNS
Migrants are often perceived as a group of vulnerable victims, especially within a legal context such as the one in this study: lawyer–client consultations in the field of immigration law. The literature describes how institutional limitations often translate into asymmetric lawyer–client dynamics. The linguistic-ethnographic data gathered for this study shows, however, that the reality is more complex
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‘F**k this game … I'm off’: financial and emotional factors in declining legal representation in miscarriage of justice cases Journal of Law and Society (IF 1.431) Pub Date : 2022-09-05 AMY CLARKE, LUCY WELSH
In this article, we use data from interviews with 45 criminal defence lawyers to examine the reasons behind a decline in publicly funded representation in applications to the Criminal Cases Review Commission (CCRC). In doing so, we pay particular attention to the relative significance of financial and emotional factors. Our analysis finds that financial factors related to changes to legal aid are significant
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Doing diversity in the legal profession in England and Wales: why do disabled people continue to be unexpected? Journal of Law and Society (IF 1.431) Pub Date : 2022-08-27 DEBORAH FOSTER, NATASHA HIRST
A call for socio-legal scholars to interrogate the relationship between law, disablement, ableism, and justice was recently made in this journal. Using research co-produced with disabled people in the legal profession in England and Wales, this article responds by asking why, in a profession that has made a significant investment in widening access and diversity, do disabled people continue to be unexpected
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The paradox of human rights and three forms for its unfolding Journal of Law and Society (IF 1.431) Pub Date : 2022-08-26 NIKLAS LUHMANN, NICO BUITENDAG
In this essay, published here for the first time in English, Niklas Luhmann shows how human rights have never been able to justify their existence to society without the use of a paradox. He identifies three general phases (or forms) through which the doctrine of human rights has developed: natural law, the positivization of law, and finally human rights as recognized through their violation and the
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Digging into legal archaeology: a methodology for case study research Journal of Law and Society (IF 1.431) Pub Date : 2022-08-25 EMMA NOTTINGHAM
Traditional legal scholarship has been dominated by doctrinal analysis. When cases are analysed, attention has commonly focused upon the legal issues, judicial reasoning, and case outcome. However, alternative approaches can lead to new or different conclusions. Legal archaeology is a type of micro-level case study research that examines a case in its socio-historical context, using mainly original
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Law, ‘presentist’ agendas, and the making of ‘official’ memory after collective violence Journal of Law and Society (IF 1.431) Pub Date : 2022-08-24 KEVIN HEARTY
This article interrogates how law is used to make ‘official’ memory in transitional justice (TJ) contexts. It posits that law performs three key roles in the ‘making’ of memory after conflict and authoritarianism: visibility, definition, and judgement. Using insights from existing academic literature that has addressed TJ processes and mechanisms across geographical sites and time frames, it argues
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From shame to guilt: negotiating moral and legal responsibility within apologies for historical institutional abuse Journal of Law and Society (IF 1.431) Pub Date : 2022-08-24 ANNE-MARIE MCALINDEN
This article explores the role of apology in addressing moral and legal responsibility for historical institutional abuse (HIA). Drawing on extensive fieldwork in Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland, it analyses juridical techniques within official apologies, principally by the Catholic Church, to circumvent legal responsibility for HIA: the use of language, the avoidance of tangible redress
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Where are the numbers? Challenging the barriers to quantitative socio-legal scholarship in the United Kingdom Journal of Law and Society (IF 1.431) Pub Date : 2022-08-15 RACHEL CAHILL-O'CALLAGHAN, LINDA MULCAHY
Legal scholars in the United Kingdom (UK) rarely adopt a quantitative approach to addressing socio-legal questions. Reasons for this are typically grounded in the nature of general education, legal education, and research training. In this article, we argue that an intellectual debate on capacity building needs to consider the conditions that have limited the production of quantitative work both within
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Synthesize this: integrating innovation governance and EU regulation of synthetic biology Journal of Law and Society (IF 1.431) Pub Date : 2022-08-08 OLIVIA HAMLYN
Responsible innovation (RI) is an innovation governance framework developed by science and technology studies (STS) that seeks to transform innovation processes. While legal academia has derived valuable insights from STS for regulating technology, it has largely overlooked the implications of developments in research on RI for the law. This article aims to address this gap using European Union governance
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The price of positionality: assessing the benefits and burdens of self-identification in research methods Journal of Law and Society (IF 1.431) Pub Date : 2022-07-26 MARK FATHI MASSOUD
What is the impact on and influence of the researcher in socio-legal studies? Drawing in part on my empirical research and professional experience, this article investigates the benefits and burdens of positionality. Positionality is the disclosure of how an author's racial, gender, class, or other self-identifications, experiences, and privileges influence research methods. A statement of positionality
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When law and data collide: the methodological challenge of conducting mixed methods research in law Journal of Law and Society (IF 1.431) Pub Date : 2022-07-18 ALYSIA BLACKHAM
A mixed methods research methodology – one that integrates both qualitative and quantitative research methods – theoretically offers substantial advantages for empirical legal scholarship. I argue that mixed methods represent both a challenge to socio-legal scholarship and an invitation to re-evaluate our approach to socio-legal research; indeed, mixed methods are well aligned with the inclusive and
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The centres and margins of transnational law: potential developments and methodological challenges Journal of Law and Society (IF 1.431) Pub Date : 2022-06-27 FLORIAN GRISEL
This article challenges the dominant socio-legal focus on the nation-state by placing emphasis on its margins. Based on a review of the vibrant scholarship in the socio-legal literature, the article sketches the features of social facts that can be found in the interstices of national legal systems and professions. Though these facts are marginalized from the perspective of these systems and professions