Description
Book SynopsisThis comprehensive Research Handbook offers a multi-faceted analysis of the politics of law and courts and their role in governing. The authors develop new theoretical, empirical and methodological approaches to the study of law and courts as institutions, while accounting for the increasing diversity and complexity of the jurisdictions they oversee.
The Research Handbook on Law and Courts features contributions from leading scholars in the United States, New Zealand, South Africa, Latin America and a number of European countries, enriching the scope of theoretical development in the field and identifying areas for future research. Chapters address courts' centrality to governance by explaining how they participate in holding democratic administrations politically accountable, as well as by highlighting the political significance of court decisions concerning citizenship and inclusion. Chapters include studies of interactions between legal arguments, courts and other institutions that rely on law, as well as reflections on the physical and digital spaces of law. This volume also examines demographic diversity in judging before concluding with discussions of increasing digitization and computing power, and the significance of both for legal processes and sociolegal scholarship.
Scholars concerned with courts and political accountability in complex, multi-layered governance will find this Research Handbook an invaluable resource. Since courts and legal structures are increasingly significant around the world, the Research Handbook will also be useful to other social scientists concerned with inclusion, representation, and accountability through law.
Trade Review'It's a distinct pleasure to see a research handbook that not only deals with classic themes in the literature, but which marks out new terrain for researchers in many different juridical and political regimes. The section on the digitalization of law and courts research was an eye-opener for me.' --Chris Hanretty, Royal Holloway, University of London, UK
'With a timely introduction followed by 32 chapters by no fewer than 50 established and early-career authors working in at least four continents, this Research Handbook represents today's most outstanding, global, and diverse scholarship on law and courts. The Research Handbook on Law and Courts synthesizes new ways that law and courts scholars encounter and study accountability, authoritarianism, populism, citizenship, diversity, democracy, gender, governance, technology, and the transformative potential of rights.'
--Mark Fathi Massoud, University of California, Santa Cruz, US
'This diverse collection highlights cutting-edge issues in scholarship on law and courts. Integrating comparative and international perspectives with forward-looking attention to technology and gender, there is something for everyone in these pages. Highly recommended.'
--Tom Ginsburg, University of Chicago, US
Table of ContentsContents: Introduction to the Research Handbook on Law and Courts Susan Sterett and Lee Walker PART I COURTS AND POLITICAL ACCOUNTABILITY 1. International Tribunals and Political Accountability James Meernik 2. Degrees of Separation: judicial-executive relations in the US and Latin America Gbemende Johnson 3. Comparing the Significance of War to High Courts of the USA, UK, and Canada Susanne Schorpp 4. Drug Policy, Violence, and Support for the Judiciary in Latin America: The "Drug Trafficking Trap" Aldo F. Ponce 5. Law, Courts and Populism: Climate Change Litigation and the Narrative Turn Chris Hilson 6. Courts and Transformative Constitutionalism: insights from South Africa Anthony Diala PART II JUDICIAL PROCESS 7. Independence in Judicial Hierarchies: Civil Law Systems Julio Rios-Figueroa 8. The Use of Precedent in U.S. Supreme Court Litigant Briefs Jessica A. Schoeneherr and Ryan C. Black 9. Challenging authorities’ (in)action via amparos Lydia Brashear Tiede and Susan Achury 10. Accountability, Authority and Documentary Fragility: Shadow files and Trial in India Mayur Suresh 11. Court Architecture and the Justice System Peter Robson, Patrícia Branco and Johnny Rodger 12. Institutional Norms, Parliament, and the Courts: Explaining the Absence of Abortion Restrictions in Canada Jonathan Parent PART III DIVERSITY 13. Gender on the International Bench Laura P. Moyer 14. Appointing Women to High Courts Maria Escobar-Lemmon, Valerie Hoekstra, Alice J. Kang, and Mikki Caul Kittilson 15. Judicial Service Commissions and the Appointment of Women to High Courts in Nigeria and Zambia Jarpa J. Dawuni and Tabeth Masengu 16. Judicial Diversity in the United States Federal Judiciary Taneshia N. Means, Kaitlin Prado, and Andrew Eslich 17. The gender and judging project: equity in Germany Ulrike Schultz PART IV SUB-NATIONAL COURTS 18. Power, activation, decision making, and impact: subnational judicial politics in Brazil Luciano Da Ros and Matthew C. Ingram 19. Understanding the determinants of opinion language borrowing in state courts in the United States Jennifer Bowie and Elisha C. Savchak 20. State High Courts and Precedent: the diffusion of precedent in the United States Ben Kassow 21. Letting the Outside In? Court Clerks, Discretion and the Shifting Boundary between Community and Court in Domestic Violence Cases in South Africa Kelley Moult 22. When do the Losers Win? Appellate Court Reversals of Civil Jury Verdicts Tao Dumas 23. Creating Space for supranational law: Environmental Legal Mobilization and Spanish NGOs Luz Muñoz and David Moya PART V COURTS, INCLUSION, AND BELONGING 24. Patrolling the Boundaries of Belonging? Courts, Law, and Citizenship Lisa Conant, Andreas Hofmann, Dagmar Soennecken, and Lisa Vanhala 25. Conflicts in Indigenous Law: Courts and Federalism in the United States and Common Law Nations Rebecca A. Reid and Todd A. Curry 26. Implicit and explicit boundaries of belonging: indigenous and minority identities Kati Nieminen 27. Domestic legal institutions and international law: the UN Women’s Rights Treaty and the Netherlands Audrey L. Comstock PART VI DIGITALIZATION OF LAW AND COURTS RESEARCH 28. Creating Digital Legal Subjects: The Use of Online Criminal Court Records for Research Sarah E. Lageson 29. All Your Data Will Be Held Against You: Secondary Use of Data from Personal Genomics & Wearable Tech Andelka M. Phillips 30. Data Infrastructure Innovation in the Field of Law and Courts: The European Court of Human Rights Database (ECHRdb) Elizabeth Chrun and Rachel Cichowski 31. ‘Text as Data’ in Law and Courts: Data Coding, Language Clarity, and Data Sharing Justin Wedeking 32. Creating Databases in Sociolegal Research: The U.S. Supreme Court Confirmation Hearings Database Paul M. Collins, Jr. and Lori A. Ringhand Index
