Description
Book SynopsisThis book considers how legal reforms and awareness raising associated with building the rule of law have engaged the popular legal consciousness, producing contradictions that have in turn shaped the nature of the resultant legality.
How are popular legal-justice beliefs and practices transformed when legal reforms encounter local contexts and cultures? For over a decade, scholars have engaged with the argument that legal reform through rule of law building is the answer to the various ills of countries transitioning from war to peace or authoritarianism to democracy. Yet, scholars have also repeatedly critiqued rule of law building projects: The rule of law, in theory and in practice, is a product of Western liberal thought and development and provides limited space for local culture, norms, and practices. This tension has been playing out in multiple locations, and in the Democratic Republic of Congo for about two decades. This book examines how rule of law reforms in the
Table of Contents
1. Problems with the Rule of Law and Research in the Eastern DRC 2. Legal Consciousness and the Construction of Emergent Hybrid Legality 3. Fraught Fieldwork: Embodied Experiences and Imagined Spaces 4. Top-Down Approaches to Shaping Legal Consciousness 5. Legal Consciousness in Context: Statutory Rape and Early Marriage 6. Popular Justice and Witchcraft: The Violent Side of Emergent Hybrid Legality 7. The Rule of Law Revisited: Lessons from Emergent Hybrid Legality in the DRC
