Skip to main content Accessibility help
×
Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-7cvxr Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-24T12:48:30.640Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

5 - Legal Mobilization

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 March 2023

Lynette J. Chua
Affiliation:
National University of Singapore
David M. Engel
Affiliation:
State University of New York, Buffalo
Sida Liu
Affiliation:
The University of Hong Kong
Get access

Summary

Legal mobilization refers to the use of law to express claims and desires in order to achieve change or protect interests. It can be carried out by individuals or by a collective of people. Importantly, legal mobilization encompasses more than going to court to litigate disputes, an action that may prove ineffective or even irrelevant in some Asian contexts. In addition to litigation, legal mobilization occurs in other ways, even when an individual or group merely articulates a problem to a confidante in terms of rights or other legal concepts. In Asia, this broader concept of legal mobilization is especially apropos, since so much “legal” activity—broadly construed—takes place far from the justice institutions the state has established. In this chapter, the readings illustrate the range of tactics used by those who mobilize the law to achieve their goals. They also illustrate both the risks and rewards associated with the invocation of legal rights in Asian societies. As the authors make clear, rights can have paradoxical effects, and can simultaneously empower and disempower or stigmatize those who use them. In some instances, however, the results are hugely beneficial to those who felt hopeless in the absence of legal protection.

Type
Chapter
Information
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2023

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Primary Sources

Becker, Margaret. 2015. “Constructing SSLM: Insights from Struggles over Women’s Rights in Nepal.” Asian Studies Review 39 (2): 247–65. doi: 10.1080/10357823.2015.1021754CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cheng, Sealing. 2011. “The Paradox of Vernacularization: Women’s Human Rights and the Gendering of Nationhood.” Anthropological Quarterly 84 (2): 475505. doi: 10.1353/anq.2011.0021CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Chua, Lynette J. 2012. “Pragmatic Resistance, Law, and Social Movements in Authoritarian States: The Case of Gay Collective Action in Singapore.” Law & Society Review 46 (4): 713–48. doi: 10.1111/j.1540-5893.2012.00515.xGoogle Scholar
Chua, Lynette J. 2019. The Politics of Love in Myanmar: LGBT Mobilization and Human Rights as a Way of Life. Palo Alto, CA: Stanford University Press.Google Scholar
De, Rohit. 2018. A People’s Constitution: The Everyday Life of Law in the Indian Republic. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press. doi: 10.1017/S073824801900066XGoogle Scholar
Ela, Nate. 2017. “Litigation Dilemmas: Lessons from the Marcos Human Rights Class Action.” Law & Social Inquiry 42 (2): 479508. doi: 10.1111/lsi.12207Google Scholar
Gallagher, Mary E. 2006. “Mobilizing the Law in China: ‘Informed Disenchantment’ and the Development of Legal Consciousness.” Law & Society Review 40 (4): 783816.Google Scholar
Nguyen, Tu Phuong. 2018. “Labour Law and (In)justice in Workers’ Letters in Vietnam.” Asian Journal of Law & Society 5 (1): 2547. doi: 10.1017/als.2017.29CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Parmar, Pooja. 2015. Indigeneity and Legal Pluralism in India: Claims, Histories, Meanings. New York: Cambridge University Press. doi: 10.1017/CBO9781139962896Google Scholar
Wang, Di, and Liu, Sida. 2020. “Performing Artivism: Feminists, Lawyers, and Online Legal Mobilization in China.” Law & Social Inquiry 45 (3): 678705. doi: 10.1017/lsi.2019.64CrossRefGoogle Scholar

Secondary Sources

Anderson, Ellen Ann. 2006. Out of the Closets and into the Courts: Legal Opportunity Structure and Gay Rights Litigation. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press. doi: 10.3998/mpub.17550Google Scholar
Arrington, Celeste L. 2021. “Rights Claiming through the Courts: Changing Legal Opportunity Structures in South Korea.” In Rights Claiming in South Korea, edited by Arrington, Celeste L. and Goedde, Patricia, 151–71. New York: Cambridge University Press. doi: 10.1017/9781108893947Google Scholar
Chua, Lynette J. 2022. The Politics of Rights and Southeast Asia. New York: Cambridge University Press. doi: 10.1017/9781108750783Google Scholar
Engel, David M. 2012. “Vertical and Horizontal Perspectives on Rights Consciousness.” Indiana Journal of Global Legal Studies 19: 423–55. doi: 10.2979/indjglolegstu.19.2.423Google Scholar
Epp, Charles R. 1998. The Rights Revolution: Lawyers, Activists, and Supreme Courts in Comparative Perspective. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Geertz, Clifford. 1964. “Ideology as a Cultural System.” In Ideology and Discontent, edited by Apter, David E., 4776. New York: Free Press.Google Scholar
Keck, Margaret E., and Sikkink, Kathryn. 1998. Activists beyond Borders: Advocacy Networks in International Politics. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press. doi: 10.7591/9780801471292Google Scholar
McCann, Michael W. 1994. Rights at Work: Pay Equity Reform and the Politics of Legal Mobilization. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
McCann, Michael W. 2014. “The Unbearable Lightness of Rights: On Sociolegal Inquiry in the Global Era.” Law & Society Review 48: 245–73. doi: 10.1111/lasr.12075Google Scholar
Merry, Sally E. 2006. Human Rights and Gender Violence. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
O’Brien, Kevin J., and Li, Lianjiang. 2006. Rightful Resistance in Rural China. New York: Cambridge University Press. doi: 10.1017/cbo9780511791086.002Google Scholar
Rosenberg, Gerald N. 2008. The Hollow Hope: Can Courts Bring About Social Change? Chicago: University of Chicago Press. doi: 10.7208/chicago/9780226726687.001.0001Google Scholar
Scheingold, Stuart A. 1974. The Politics of Rights: Lawyers, Public Policy, and Political Change. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press.Google Scholar
Scott, James C. 1984. Weapons of the Weak: Everyday Forms of Peasant Resistance. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.Google Scholar
Tsutsui, Kiyoteru. 2017. “Human Rights and Minority Activism in Japan: Transformation of Movement Actorhood and Local-Global Feedback Loop.” American Journal of Sociology 122: 1050–103. doi: 10.1086/689910Google Scholar
Yeo, Andrew, and Chubb, Danielle. 2018. North Korean Human Rights: Activists and Networks. New York: Cambridge University Press. doi: 10.1017/9781108589543Google Scholar
Zemans, Frances.1983. “The Neglected Role of the Law in the Political System.” American Political Science Review 77: 690703. doi: 10.2307/1957268Google Scholar
Arrington, Celeste L., and Goedde, Patricia, eds. 2021. Rights Claiming in South Korea. New York: Cambridge University Press. doi: 10.1017/9781108893947CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Harms, Erik. 2016. Luxury and Rubble: Civility and Dispossession in the New Saigon. Oakland: University of California Press. doi: 10.1525/luminos.20Google Scholar
Stern, Rachel E. 2013. Environmental Litigation in China: A Study in Political Ambivalence. New York: Cambridge University Press. doi: 10.1017/CBO9781139096614Google Scholar

Save book to Kindle

To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure [email protected] is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.

Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.

Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.

  • Legal Mobilization
  • Lynette J. Chua, National University of Singapore, David M. Engel, State University of New York, Buffalo, Sida Liu, The University of Hong Kong
  • Book: The Asian Law and Society Reader
  • Online publication: 02 March 2023
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/9781108864824.006
Available formats
×

Save book to Dropbox

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.

  • Legal Mobilization
  • Lynette J. Chua, National University of Singapore, David M. Engel, State University of New York, Buffalo, Sida Liu, The University of Hong Kong
  • Book: The Asian Law and Society Reader
  • Online publication: 02 March 2023
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/9781108864824.006
Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

  • Legal Mobilization
  • Lynette J. Chua, National University of Singapore, David M. Engel, State University of New York, Buffalo, Sida Liu, The University of Hong Kong
  • Book: The Asian Law and Society Reader
  • Online publication: 02 March 2023
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/9781108864824.006
Available formats
×