Advancing the Study of Judicial Behavior with a Cultural Theory of Political Values
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 21 October 2022
A significant undiscussed problem with the leading conceptualization of ideologically based judicial behavior, Jeffrey Segal and Harold Spaeth’s attitudinal model, is its lack of theory. This problem leads to circular reasoning, ad hoc coding adjustments, and inaccurate characterizations and explanations of case outcomes, judicial votes and ideologies, and trends in judicial behavior. A values-based theory of ideology, such as the cultural theory pioneered by Mary Douglas, Michael Thompson, Aaron Wildavsky, and others, can help remedy this problem. Applying this cultural theory to First Amendment cases, we find that political cultures valuing equality, order, and liberty provide a more accurate account of judicial decisions than labeling them liberal or conservative.
We thank Joshua Bruce for helping to inspire this article with his 2012 Indiana University senior honor’s thesis, “A Cultural Theory of Judicial Decision-Making among United States Supreme Court Justices,” supervised by Eileen Braman. We thank law and courts panels at the Southern, Midwest, and American Political Science Association (APSA) annual meetings for helpful feedback on earlier iterations of this article, particularly discussants Terri Peretti, Jeff Segal, and Amy Steigerwalt and audience members Joshua Fischman and David Hughes. We thank Mitch Pickerill for facilitating some of this feedback by organizing the APSA panel on which we participated and for his own comments on our presentation. We thank Dave Klein and the anonymous reviewers at the Journal of Law and Courts for their helpful feedback and Chandra Hunter Swedlow for emotional support and editorial assistance.