This article examines the representations of law and legal actors offered within two classic American films: To Kill a Mockingbird and Judgment at Nuremberg. It has previously been argued that these films belong to a ‘heroic tradition’ within American cinema; one that idealises both men of law and man-made law and that had its golden age from the mid-1950s through to the end of the 1960s. It is argued here that these films offer a more complex and far less certain portrayal of the law and legal actors. This is examined first by considering the context in which these films were made, and second, the depictions of law and legal actors that they offer.

Contemporary initiatives to address civilian victimisation in armed conflict increasingly focus on international criminal justice institutions, rules and practices. These institutions are now expected to construct legal recognition of civilian victims of armed conflict, as well as prosecute the perpetrators. This article uses a case-study of the Prosecutor v. Dragomir Milošević heard by the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia to explore the concept of the civilian. It first examines the international legal frameworks and obligations that enforce the protection of civilians. It then explores the concept of the civilian as defined by the rules of humanitarian law, and the different approaches to defining civilians utilised by the parties to the Milošević trial. The article argues that the current ‘negative’ definition of civilians creates significant difficulties for understanding civilians as a distinct category of persons, and does not adequately capture their choices, actions and experiences in armed conflict.

Love is ever-present in the debate for the legal recognition of same-sex marriage. Its importance, however, is often underestimated. I will show in this article that much can be gained by viewing this issue through the analytical lens of romantic love. This analysis will show that romantic love is a contested idea. On the one hand it claims to embody a radical and permissive ideology that is capable of penetrating established social and cultural divides. On the other hand, however, love has been accused of replicating patriarchy, and of being ideologically heteronormative. As such, love is not necessarily the answer needed to win the legal argument for same-sex marriage – not unless we begin a process of redefining love for our times.

German sociology of law has developed along a peculiar path which is still shaping its development today. Unlike other special areas of sociology that extended sociologists' inquiry to new fields, the sociology of law was founded mainly by lawyers in the early twentieth century as a tool for enhanced professional practice. The sociology of law became part of a struggle over the academic identity of jurisprudence. This first wave of German sociology of law was then overshadowed by a second wave in the 1960s and 1970s along the lines of legal reform and radical scholarship. Today, the sociology of law in Germany is receiving renewed interest under the labels of empirical legal research and of inter- and transdisciplinarity, and scholars are to a large degree still driven by political interests.