In their empirical exploration of law, sociolegal scholars reveal the broad range of actors that influence law. The articles in this issue are no exception to this general observation: here, the research chronicled explores how traditional legal actors (courts and lawyers), activists, lay representatives, and litigants influence both formal law and law in practice.
Several articles in this volume reveal important, yet subtle, influences on the law, taking us outside the more traditional contexts we associate with the making of law. Thus, Boyd, Collins, and Ringhand engage with the role of nominee gender and race in U.S. Supreme Court confirmation hearings. Wilson and Hollis-Brusky offer an account of the manner in which Christian conservatives have used law schools to push a legal activist agenda in line with evangelical values. And, looking to activists and lawyers in a different context, Ruibal examines legal mobilization through feminist litigation strategies in Salta, Argentina. Longazel focuses on the practices of non-lawyers, or Accredited Representatives, in immigration law. The picture that emerges is a complex one, with implications for immigration governance and access to justice. Finally, the article by Remster and Cramer reminds us of the importance of state actors such as the police, exploring how the use of force during investigative stops varies with the race of the individual stopped.
An interesting subtheme in this issue runs through the three pieces that focus on real property rights outside of the United States. Canfield uses the “global land grab” that occurred after the 2007–2008 food crisis to illustrate how practices of collaborative global governance are framed and, sometimes, co-opted. The piece by Mulumeoderhwa continues the focus on real property in its research engagement with the role gender plays in real property inheritance in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Ayano adds to this group of articles with an account of how the Ethiopian land registration system intersects with customary land rights in often unpredictable and undesirable ways.
In total, these pieces provide rich texture and geographical diversity to the notion offered by Roscoe Pound that law is far more than simply “law on the books.”
