Cause Lawyering: Political Commitments and Professional Responsibilities / Edition 1

by Stuart Scheingold, Austin Sarat

Overview

Why do some lawyers devote themsevles to a specific social movement or political cause? What can we learn from such lawyers about the relationship between law and politics. CAUSE LAWYERING offers an insightful portrait of lawyers who sacrifice financial advantage in the name of a more just society. These telling essays show how cause lawyering is indispensable to the legitimization of professional authority.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780195113204
Publisher:	Oxford University Press, USA
Publication date:	01/28/1998
Series:	Oxford Socio-Legal Studies Series
Edition description:	New Edition
Pages:	576
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.10(h) x 1.60(d)

About the Author

Austin Sarat is William Nelson Cromwell Professor of Jurisprudence and Political Science at Amherst College. He has written and edited many books and articles on the theory and practice of law, including Race, Law, and Culture (OUP, 1997) and Divorce Lawyers and Their Clients (OUP, 1995).
Stuart Scheingold is Professor of Political Science at the University of Washington, Seattle. He is the author of The Politics of Street Crime (1991) and The Politics of Law and Order (1984), among other books.

Table of Contents

Cause Lawyering and the Reproduction of Professional Authority: An Introduction, Austin Sarat and Stuart Scheingold
CONTEXTS AND CONDITIONS OF CAUSE LAWYERING
The Causes of Cause Lawyering: Toward an Understanding of the Motivation and Commitment of Social Justice Lawyers, Carrie Menkel-Meadow
Speaking Law to Power: Occasions for Cause Lawyering, Richard Abel
The Struggle to Politicize Legal Practice: A Case Study of Left-Activist Lawyering in Seattle, Stuart Scheingold
CAUSE LAWYERING AND THE ORGANIZATION OF PRACTICE
Norris, Schmidt, Green, Harris, Higginbotham & Associates: The Socio-Legal Impact of Philadelphia Cause Lawyers, Aaron Porter
Still Trying: Cause Lawyering for the Poor and Disadvantaged in Pittsburg, PA, John Kilwein
Critical Lawyers: Social Justice and the Structure of Private Practice, Louise Trubek and M. Elizabeth Kransberger
Destruction of Houses and Construction of a Cause: Lawyers and Bedouins in the Israeli Courts, Ronen Shamir and Sara Chinski
STRATEGIES OF CAUSE LAWYERING UNDER LIBERAL LEGALISM
Rethinking Law's Allurements: A Relational Analysis of Social Movement Lawyers in the United States, Michael McCann and Helena Silverstein
Caring about Individual Cases: Immigration Lawyering in Britain, Susan Street
Between (the Presence of) Violence and (the Possibility of) Justice: Lawyering against Capital Punishment, Austin Sarat
THE POSSIBILITIES OF CAUSE LAWYERING BEYOND LIBERAL LEGALISM
Cause Lawyering in the Third World, Stephen Ellmann
Lawyers' Causes in Indonesia and Malaysia, Daniel Lev
Attorneys for the People, Attorneys for the Land: The Emergence of Cause Lawyering in the Israel-Occupied Territories, George Bisharat
Cause Lawyers and Social Movements: A Comparative Perspective on Democratic Change in Argentina and Brazil, Stephen Meili
All or Nothing: An Inquiry into the (Im)Possibility of Cause Lawyering under Cuban Socialism, Raymond Michalowski
REFERENCES

Editorial Reviews

"Cause Lawyering offers a fascinating collection of empirical and theoretical work on a topic of considerable importance. This book also provides a set of tools and organizing principles that should reinvigorate both national and comparative studies of what has become a neglected sector of the legal profession—those trying to improve the lives of the disadvantaged."—Bryant Garth, Director of the American Bar Foundation

"Cause Lawyering is a comprehensive, transnational description and analysis of lawyers who put social goals ahead of client considerations. In elegant and provocative terms, Professors Sarat and Scheingold and their colleagues tell us what cause lawyers do, who they are, why they are committed to social causes, and what they accomplish. These lawyers, frequently working at the margins of legal systems and rarely well-paid, are the true statespeople of the legal profession and it is fitting that their efforts be analyzed by such an accomplished and thoughtful group of sociolegal scholars."—William L. F. Felstiner, Distinguished Research Professor of Law, University of Wales, Cardiff

"Very strong....There is not a bad essay in the collection; some of the essays are strikingly fresh and original. The range of essays, extending to cause lawyering in various undeveloped societies and contrasting these with the liberal societies of the West, is especially impressive. The essays are, on the average, so much better than anything else in their field that they set a new standard for the study of cause lawyers....A first-rate collection...there is nothing I know of in print that approaches it in quality and breath."—Robert Gordon, Yale Law School

"Brilliant essays expose the spectrum of activities undertaken by cause lawyers to foster their commitments to justice beyond the boundaries of law and politics....Suitable for faculty and graduate students in public law, this book presents a clear and lucid picture of the concept of cause lawyering."—Choice

From the Publisher