The Giving and Withdrawal of New Rights: A Natural Experiment In Legal Consciousness

University Of San Francisco, San Francisco CA

Investigators

Abstract

The relationships between social institutions and the development of legal consciousness and mobilization are among the central concerns of sociolegal scholarship. This study takes advantage of a unique natural experiment to examine the ways in which legal consciousness -- including the orientation of citizens to the law and the invocation of laws and legal rights -- is affected by changes in state-level legal norms and institutions. The study will rely on systematic qualitative data analysis of interviews with respondents, using NVIVO software to isolate analytic themes and patterns of reasoning, as well as on quantitative analysis of survey data from the entire population of individuals affected by the legal changes in question in one major metropolitan area. The research will offer novel and important insights into the engagement of citizens with the law, not only revealing the perceived role of law according to the citizen being studied, but also whether and how likely they are to enact their rights or turn to the law to resolve their problems.