Mechanisms Underlying Familial Influence on Elite Political Behavior: Evidence from the U.S. Circuit Courts of Appeals

2021 ◽  
Vol 0 (0) ◽  
Author(s):  
Daniel Lempert ◽  
Alyse Camacho

Abstract This article contributes to the literature addressing family influences on elite political behavior. By empirically assessing the influence of sibling gender on judicial decision-making, we are able to present evidence on the mechanism by which child, sibling and other relatives’ gender may influence elite political behavior. We build on a published dataset by mining various archival sources to compile data on the gender of judges’ siblings. We find no evidence that male judges’ votes on so-called “women’s issues” (employment discrimination based on gender or pregnancy, reproductive rights/abortion, and Title IX) are affected by whether they have a sister, and we are able to rule out large effects of a sibling’s gender on male and female judges’ votes. Our results imply that the relationship between family member gender and elite political behavior is driven by the desire to avoid costs of discrimination, rather than learning from family members.

1995 ◽  
Vol 75 (1) ◽  
pp. 69-89 ◽  
Author(s):  
MICHAEL S. VAUGHN ◽  
ROLANDO V. DEL CARMEN

This article focuses on civil liabilities imposed on prison officials for inmate-by-inmate assault in correctional facilities. After briefly discussing the statistical frequency of inmate-by-inmate assault, the article examines Farmer v. Brennan, a case on inmate-by-inmate assault decided in 1994 by the U.S. Supreme Court. Through an analysis of 96 pre-Farmer cases on inmate assault decided in the U.S. circuit courts of appeals, the article outlines the parameters under which officials might be held liable in post-Farmer litigation. The article concludes that the circumstances and situations under which prison officials are liable will not sufficiently change because the realities of judicial decision making may make it difficult for individual judges to distinguish between pre-Farmer and post-Farmer standards.


2020 ◽  
Vol 53 (8) ◽  
pp. 1326-1356
Author(s):  
Whitney K. Taylor

Leveraging comparisons within and across cases, this article investigates legal mobilization for social rights in Colombia and South Africa. This kind of rights contestation represents a new phenomenon, in which both ordinary citizens and judicial actors have come to view problems related to access to health care, housing, education, and social security through the lens of the law. Research on legal mobilization has tended toward one-sided examinations of this complex phenomenon, focusing primarily on either legal claims-making or judicial decision-making, and neglecting to fully theorize the relationship between the two. Drawing on an analysis of rights claims and 178 interviews, this article aims to correct these imbalances. In doing so, it offers a generalizable model that accounts for the social construction of legal grievances and the development of judicial receptivity to particular kinds of claims, and explains both the emergence and continuation of legal mobilization for social rights.


2002 ◽  
Vol 96 (4) ◽  
pp. 755-766 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ethan Bueno de Mesquita ◽  
Matthew Stephenson

We develop an informational model of judicial decision-making in which deference to precedent is useful to policy-oriented appellate judges because it improves the accuracy with which they can communicate legal rules to trial judges. Our simple model yields new implications and hypotheses regarding conditions under which judges will maintain or break with precedent, the constraining effect that precedent has on judicial decision-making, the voting behavior of Supreme Court Justices, the relationship between a precedent's age and its authority, the effect of legal complexity on the level of deference to precedent, the relative stability of rules and standards, and long-term patterns of legal evolution. Perhaps most importantly, we demonstrate that “legalist” features of judicial decision-making are consistent with an assumption of policy-oriented judges.


1958 ◽  
Vol 52 (4) ◽  
pp. 1007-1025 ◽  
Author(s):  
Glendon A. Schubert

In a recent essay, Richard Snyder has stated that: “[A] paradox in political science is the lack … of any systematic attention to the analysis of the decision-making behavior of judges.” It is not my purpose to argue either for or against the particular frame of reference for decision-making analysis advocated by Snyder. I do believe, however, that he has correctly identified the approach—the analysis of judicial decision-making as an aspect of political behavior—which is most likely to command the focus of interest and activity of the coming generation of political scientists whose substantive concern is with the study of political problems in the area of our discipline traditionally known as public law.The concept “political behavior” remains sufficiently novel within the public law fraternity to impose something of an obligation to make clear what I have in mind in using the term. I shall borrow from David B. Truman who, in a Brookings Lecture not long ago, defined the “behavioral sciences” as “those bodies of knowledge, in whatever academic department they may be found, that provide or aspire to provide ‘verified principles’ of human behavior through the use of methods of inquiry similar to those of the natural sciences.”


Author(s):  
Kevin Dekoster

Abstract Drawing on a sample of 875 forensic medical reports produced within the early modern County of Flanders, this contribution aims to analyse and explain some developments in the medico-legal discourse of violent crime. While sixteenth-century post-mortem reports essentially deal with assessing the lethality of wounds, later centuries witnessed a more elaborate approach to violent death, in which attempts were made to establish the relationship between a wound and fatality by reconstructing its pathology. In this way, medical expertise contributed to a more nuanced qualification of violent crime, thoroughly influencing judicial decision-making by bringing new attenuating circumstances into play, while adhering to a cautious empiricist epistemology. This cautiousness also constituted one of the weaknesses of the reports, making their content vulnerable to criticism by judicial officials whose primary concern was to resolve homicide cases.


2018 ◽  
Vol 2 (89) ◽  
Author(s):  
Dovilė Valančienė

Research  background  and  hypothesis.  Today,  more  and  more  discussions  arise  about  the  effect  of  a  new science – postmodern, of complex dynamic systems – on the science of law. The law science is encouraged to be open both internally and externally with other sciences. The new science encourages other sciences to seek for dialogue, connection and integration; one example of this is neurolaw. Neurolaw is an association of neuroscience and law science aiming at a clearer understanding and coming closer to the truth than it was before, using the achievements of neuroscience. This is a new association which causes much debate. How can it help the law? Is this just a temporary fashion? These are topical issues for the law science to move towards perfection, and for the neuroscience to be adaptable and very important to other sciences. Research aim. A conceptual overview of the essence of neuroscience and neurolaw, answering the question about how neuroscience can help the law, and if the dialogue between them is inevitable or just a temporary fashion.Research methods. Systematic and logical analysis of the relationship between neuroscience and law.Discussion and conclusions. Neurolaw is an inevitable dialogue between law and neuroscience. This is the integration of the two sciences in order to get a clearer understanding of complex legal issues when we deal with people’s destinies, and most important, to answer what is true in a particular case. We cannot say that this is just a temporary fashion, more scientific research is carried out and with the help of this dialogue more cases can achieve the equitable solution. On the other hand, various studies related to the judicial decision-making are important to neurolaw, as they look into how decisions are made, what influences them, etc. Conceptualizing this integration as well as the importance and the scope of the dialogue between these sciences, we can say that law science will inevitably face major changes in this area. The future of this inevitable integration depends on how scientists will be able to communicate and achieve the fairest goals for us.Keywords: integration, changes, the new science.


2019 ◽  
Vol 8 (4) ◽  
Author(s):  
Maria Isabel Rosifini Alves Rezende

Como os juízes decidem? A resposta a essa pergunta comporta dois vieses, um seguindo a linha formalista, segundo a qual a atividade de julgar consiste, basicamente, em uma subsunção – isto é, o julgador nada mais é do que um operador de uma grande máquina de silogismo, aplicando a lei abstrata a um caso concreto, de forma mecânica; e outro que observa a linha realista, por meio da qual referida atividade depende, principalmente, de outros elementos, denominados extralegais, por serem alheios ao Direito.O presente ensaio tem como objetivo demonstrar qual movimento se aplica, na prática, ao processo decisório judicial, principalmente no âmbito do Poder Judiciário Brasileiro.Para tanto, será feita, sucintamente, uma distinção entre as linhas formalista e realista. Após, serão expostos alguns métodos e modelos criados com o escopo de esclarecer como funciona o processo de tomada de decisão, bem como será analisado, brevemente, o princípio da imparcialidade, a fim de que se chegue às considerações finais de maneira genérica.Descritores: Teoria da decisão; Decisões Judiciais; Jurisprudência; Julgamento.ReferênciasTumonis V. Legal Realism & Judicial Decision-Making. Jurisprudence. 2012;19(4):1361-82.Posner RA. How judges think. London: Harvard University Press; 2008.Frank J. Courts on trial: mith and reality in american justice. Princeton: Princeton University Press; 1973.Hutcheson Jr JC. Judgment Intuitive: The Function of the “Hunch” in Judicial Decision. 1929, p. 274-88.Richards D. When judges have a hunch – intuition and experience in judicial decision-making. ARSP. 2016;102(2):245-60.Struchiner N, Brando MS. Como os juízes decidem os casos difíceis do direito? Novas Fronteiras da Teoria do Direito: da filosofia moral à psicologia experimental.  Rio de Janeiro: PoD/PUC Rio; 2013.Cestari R, Nojiri S. Intepretações históricas e teóricas do Realismo Jurídico. XXIV Encontro Nacional do CONPEDI – UFS, Teorias da Decisão e Realismo Jurídico; 2015. p. 142-66.Holmes Jr OW. Lochner v. New York, 198 U.S. 45, 76. 1905.Leiter B. Rethinking legal realism: toward a naturalized jurisprudence. Tex L Rev. 1997; 76(2):267-315.Friedman B. The politics of judicial review. Tex L Rev. 2005;84(2):257-337.Horta RL, Costa AA. Das Teorias da Interpretação à Teoria da Decisão: por uma perspectiva realista acerca das influências e constrangimentos sobre a atividade judicial. R Opin Jur. 2017;15(20):271-97.Ferreira PFAN. Como decidem os ministros do STF: pontos ideais e dimensões de preferências [dissertação]. Brasília: Universidade de Brasília; 2013.Cross  FB.  Decisionmaking  in  the   U.S.  Circuit Courts of Appeals. Cal L Rev. 2003;91(6):1457-515.Hughes CE. Addresses and papers of Charles Evans Hughes,Governor of New York,1906-1908. New York: GP Putnam’s Sons; 1908.Ribeiro LM, Arguelhes DW. Preferências, Estratégias e Motivações: Pressupostos institucionais de teorias sobre comportamento judicial e sua transposição para o caso brasileiro, Rev Direito e Prax. 2013;4(7):85-121.Segal JA, Spaeth HJ. The Supreme Court and the Attitudinal Model. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press; 1993.Kahneman D, Frederick S. A model of heuristic judgment. The Cambridge handbook of thinking and reasoning. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press; 2005.Stanovich KE, West RF. Individual differences in reasoning: implications for the rationality debate? Heuristics and biases: the psychology of intuitive judgment. Gilovich T, Griffin D, Kahneman D (org). New York: Cambridge University Press; 2002.Costa EJF. Levando a imparcialidade a sério: proposta de um modelo interseccional entre direito processual, economia e psicologia [tese]. São Paulo:Pontifícia Universidade Católica; 2016.Guthrie C, Rachlinski JJ, Wistrich AJ. Blinking on the bench: how judges decide cases. Cornell L Rev. 2007; 93(1):1-43.


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