CAUSE LAWYERS AND SOCIAL MOVEMENTS

Vol. 16 No. 9 (September, 2006) pp.700-703

CAUSE LAWYERS AND SOCIAL MOVEMENTS, by Austin Sarat and Stuart A. Scheingold (eds). Stanford, California: Stanford University Press, 2006. 360pp. Cloth. $75.00. ISBN: 0-8047-5360-1. Paper. $29.95. ISBN: 0-8047-5361-X.

Reviewed by Mark Kessler, Department of Politics, Bates College. Email: mkessler [at] bates.edu.

Stuart Scheingold’s (1974) seminal work on the politics of rights inspired a generation of scholars interested in the relationship between legal rights, lawyers’ practices, and social change. In recent years Scheingold’s collaboration with Austin Sarat on three co-edited volumes (Sarat and Scheingold 1998; 2001; 2005) and one co-authored book (Scheingold and Sarat 2004) refocused attention on the relationship between rights and change by examining the roles, motivations, professional dilemmas, and activities of public interest, or “cause” lawyers. In a worthy addition to this body of work, Sarat and Scheingold’s new edited collection, CAUSE LAWYERS AND SOCIAL MOVEMENTS, presents research examining the role of lawyers and legal practices in a politics of rights from the perspective of a broad range of social movements that they seek to serve.

Thirteen articles, usefully placed in context by an introductory chapter written by Sarat and Scheingold, examine the complex relations between lawyers and movements. The selections are consistently excellent and, as a whole, they raise and begin to answer significant questions. In particular, selections in this volume assess the efficacy of lawyers for social movements and their causes – “what cause lawyers can do for, and to, a social movement” (p.3) – as well as the ways in which movements affect the practices of lawyers sympathetic to their goals. The volume attends to the ways in which lawyers help or hinder the movements with which they interact and how movements may both energize and constrain lawyers, encouraging them to engage in political practices that distinguish them from regular lawyers, while perhaps limiting their professional independence and autonomy.

The book is divided into three sections. The first focuses on macro-level questions regarding the “life cycle” of social movements and cause lawyers. Michael McCann and Jeffrey Dudas provide an insightful account of how broad historical changes in the political environment, climate, and culture of the United States have changed the work of lawyers who seek to assist social movements. Placing their analysis in the context of broader domestic and international trends, they explore the question of why public interest lawyers for progressive causes face a more hostile legal environment in the early years of the 21st century than in the 1950s and 60s. Other selections in this section examine in historical context the work of lawyers for specific movements and causes, such as civil rights (Thomas Hilbrink), the rights of same sex couples to marry (Scott Barclay and Shauna Fisher), consumer rights (Stephen Meili), and the rights of Central [*701] American refugees seeking asylum (Susan Bibler Coutin). Among other things, these selections suggest that, over time, the experiences gained by lawyers for specific movements in particular locations will shape and perhaps shift their role conceptions and attitudes toward law and the legal system, as well as their actual practices.

A second section examines the specific work that cause lawyers do for particular movements, focusing on tensions between legal advocacy and political activism. Sandra Levitsky describes the ways in which lawyers for Chicago’s GLBT movement dominate decision-making processes, producing animosity toward these lawyers among some movement activists. Anna-Maria Marshall’s research leads her to draw somewhat different conclusions. She describes the relationship between lawyers and environmental groups as “tenuous,” but often beneficial to movements, as they educate political activists about law and legal procedures and, at times, work cooperatively on comprehensive strategies for change. Kevin den Dulk describes relations between lawyers and a conservative social movement, evangelical Christians, as generally cooperative and highlights important movement gains that are, at least in part, due to the practices of lawyers. This case study shows how lawyers for conservative causes appropriate the strategies and tactics used historically by progressive cause lawyers and the innovative ways in which discourses about rights are reinterpreted and employed on behalf of those seeking to, among other things, restrict abortion rights and encourage state support for religious educational institutions.

Lynn C. Jones also focuses attention on the constitutive properties of law and legal argumentation, introducing the concept of “framing” to illustrate an important practice of cause lawyers. Lawyers may frame conditions experienced by individuals and movements as “unjust” and find ways to articulate demands in legally relevant ways. Lawyers also may react to the frames proposed by opponents by offering “counterframes” that help to further the movement’s goals. Finally, Corey S. Shdaidmah employs interview data with legal services and private public interest lawyers to discuss the ways in which cause lawyers may possess “intersecting identities” as movement activists and legal professionals. This subtle and nuanced analysis suggests the ways in which lawyers make sense of their potentially conflicting roles and highlights both the opportunities and challenges for lawyers of pursuing social justice through the legal system.

A final section examines the roles that cause lawyers may play outside of courtrooms. Selections look at lawyers’ participation in a campaign for a “living wage” in Santa Monica (Kathleen Erskine and Judy Marblestone), a legislative campaign on behalf of the United Farm Workers (Jennifer Gordon), and the work of lawyers seeking to mobilize political support on behalf of community economic development (Scott L. Cummings). [*702]

Overall, the volume’s selections suggest that relationships between lawyers and social movements are multifaceted and that the utility of lawyers for movements is historically contingent and situationally variable, dependent upon the movement, the moment in the life cycle examined, and the specific circumstances surrounding issues of concern to movements, among other things. The articles included in this volume show both the direct and more indirect effects of legal practices on movements and, in particular, the ways in which the mobilization of law by movements through their lawyers may spur both political mobilization and counter mobilization. Some of the case studies show how lawyers may collaborate productively with movements, while others call attention to the potential danger of cause lawyers playing the dominant role and legalizing the aspirations of movements in ways that depoliticize grievances in counterproductive ways. Several of the selections suggest that the boundary between roles as legal professional and political activist blur for many cause lawyers, creating tensions and conflicts that must be negotiated.

Many of the themes developed in these case studies build upon what Scheingold (2004) has called the “new politics of rights” in the preface to the recently published second edition of his classic work. His revised description, drawing on contemporary scholarship on rights, continues to conceive of rights as a contingent political resource that may be used by opposing sides in political struggle, but focuses greater attention on the multiple and varied ways in which the social, political, and cultural context shape the specific ways in which rights are given meaning and deployed and the many and sometimes contradictory affects that their use may have on legal professionals. The case studies presented in this volume provide empirical illustrations of aspects of the “new politics of rights” as it pertains to the work of social movements and cause lawyers, showing the opportunities, constraints, and major dilemmas confronted by cause lawyers who work with and for social movements as well as the challenges for social movements that work with professional legal advocates.

This book represents an important contribution to our understanding of the role of lawyers in social movements and how cause lawyers and movements work together in various ways as they engage in a politics of rights. Together with their previous collaborative works on cause lawyers, Austin Sarat and Stuart Scheingold have taught us a great deal about the utility of lawyers and legal rights for social and political change, usefully highlighted the political significance of studying the practices of public interest lawyers in a politics of rights, and helped set an agenda for exciting and politically relevant research.

REFERENCES:

Sarat, Austin, and Stuart A. Scheingold (eds.). 1998. CAUSE LAWYERING: POLITICAL COMMITMENTS AND PROFESSIONAL RESPONSIBILITIES. New York: Oxford University Press. [*703]

Sarat, Austin, and Stuart A. Scheingold (eds.). 2001. CAUSE LAWYERING AND THE STATE IN A GLOBAL ERA. New York: Oxford University Press.

Sarat, Austin, and Stuart A. Scheingold (eds.). 2005. THE WORLDS CAUSE LAWYERS MAKE: STRUCTURE AND AGENCY IN LEGAL PRACTICE. Stanford, California: Stanford University Press.

Scheingold, Stuart A. 1974. THE POLITICS OF RIGHTS: LAWYERS, PUBLIC POLICY, AND POLITICAL CHANGE. New Haven: Yale University Press.

Scheingold, Stuart A. 2004. THE POLITICS OF RIGHTS: LAWYERS, PUBLIC POLICY, AND POLITICAL CHANGE. Second edition. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press.

Scheingold, Stuart A., and Austin Sarat. 2004. SOMETHING TO BELIEVE IN: POLITICS, PROFESSIONALISM, AND CAUSE LAWYERING. Stanford, California: Stanford University Press.

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