Nobody's Law shows how people - who are disappointed, disenchanted, and outraged about the justice system - gradually move away from law. Using detailed case studies and combining different theoretical perspectives, this book explores the legal consciousness of ordinary people, businessmen, and street-level bureaucrats in the Netherlands. The empirical research in this study tells an original and alternative narrative about the role of law in everyday life. While previous studies emphasize the law's hegemony and argue that it's 'all over', Hertogh shows that legal proliferation makes it harder for people to know, and subsequently identify with, the law. As a result, official law has become increasingly remote and irrelevant to many people. The central finding presented in this highly topical text is that these developments signal a process of 'legal alienation'- a gradual and mundane process with potentially serious consequences for the legitimacy of law. A timely and original study, this book will be of particular interest to scholars in the fields of law and society, socio-legal studies and legal theory.

Autorentext

Marc Hertogh is Professor of Socio-Legal Studies at the University of Groningen, the Netherlands.

Zusammenfassung

The first book to examine the erosion of legal legitimacy in everyday life. Unlike previous studies on legal consciousness, it does not illustrate the 'hegemony' of law but rather the 'progressive divorce of law from the consciousness of citizens'. Also, building on previous studies, this study will introduce the concept of 'legal alienation'.

Inhalt

Chapter 1. Introduction.- PART I: A DIFFERENT STORY ABOUT LAW.- Chapter 2. The Myth of Dutch Legal Culture.- Chapter 3. Legalists, Loyalists, Cynics, and Outsiders.- Chapter 4. Research Methods: Through the Lens of Legal Consciousness.- PART II: LEGAL ALIENATION IN EVERYDAY LIFE.- Chapter 5. A School Director and Non-Discrimination Law.- Chapter 6. Contractors and Competition Law.- Chapter 7. Front-Line Officials and Public Law.- PART III: CONCLUSIONS.- Chapter 8. Marking the Unremarkable.- Chapter 9. Nobody's Law: Past, Present and Future.