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Law's Strange Allure: The Power of Legal Lore beyond the Law‐Politics Divide

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 December 2018

Naomi Murakawa
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Abstract

American political culture is both seduced and repulsed by legal power, and this essay reviews Gordon Silverstein's contribution to understanding the causes and consequences of “law's allure.” Using interbranch analysis, Silverstein argues that law is dangerously alluring as a political shortcut, but ultimately he concludes that law offers no exit from “normal politics” and the hard work of “changing minds.” This essay suggests that Silverstein's framework—his dyadic focus on courts and Congress, constructive and deconstructive patterns, legal formality and normal politics—strips law from its animating context of interests, inequality, and ideology. Without consideration of these larger forces of power, Silverstein's framework misplaces law's ability to “change minds” in perverse and unexpected ways.

Type
Review Essay
Information
Law & Social Inquiry , Volume 35 , Issue 4 , Fall 2010 , pp. 1065 - 1076
Copyright
Copyright © American Bar Foundation, 2010 

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