This article reevaluates the relationship between cause lawyering and community mobilization, highlighting both the continuities and shifts from traditional CED practices toward more adversarial and politically engaged lawyering.
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Sarat and Scheingold (1998), Cause Lawyering: Political Commitments and Professional Responsibilities
This book is a cross-national study of lawyers who devote themselves to serving political causes.
Boukalas (2013), “Politics as Legal Action/Lawyers as Political Actors: Towards a Reconceptualisation of Cause Lawyering”
This article examines the ‘resolutions movement,’ a popular political mobilization led by lawyers that operates through legal discourse and targets legal objectives as a form of resistance to contemporary US counterterrorism policies.
Baer (2019), “Democracy in Peril: A Call for Amici and Amicae Curiae and Critical Lawyering”
In the face of rising autocratic populism, this article underscores the vital role of critical lawyering in upholding the independence and integrity of constitutional courts, which are key pillars of democratic governance.
Graczyk (2024), “Postwar Convictions of Nazi Judges and Prosecutors for Their Activities in the Occupied Polish Territories (1939-1945)”
This article provides a synthetic overview of prior research into the postwar criminal convictions of lawyers, specifically judges and prosecutors, who operated in Nazi-occupied Polish territories.
Rogers (2005), “Power to Law: It’s Not as Bad as All That”
This book examines how legal practitioners can both enable and resist democratic erosion, depending on how they interpret, wield, or subvert the law.
Simpson (2008), “Warriors, Humanitarians, Lawyers: The Howard Government and the Use of Force”
In backsliding democracies or states engaged in controversial military actions, attorneys serve as key actors in holding governments accountable to international law, interpreting complex legal standards like the crime of aggression, and ensuring legal debates remain part of public discourse.
Turner (2002), “Intentional Targeting of Regime Elites: The Legal and Policy Debate”
This article highlights the complex legal and ethical challenges attorneys face when addressing state-sanctioned actions like targeted assassinations especially in the context of national security and counterterrorism.
Arend (2002), “International Law and Rogue States: The Failure of the Charter Framework”
In backsliding democracies facing such state behavior—whether through repression, abuse of power, or militarized actions—attorneys play a critical role as defenders of legal order and democratic accountability.
Hsu (2019), “The Political Origins of Professional Identity: Lawyers, Judges, and Prosecutors in Taiwan’s State Transformation”
This article argues that moments of political upheaval shape the legal profession’s collective identity, showing how divergent experiences under authoritarianism in Taiwan led judges, lawyers, and prosecutors to develop distinct normative commitments based on their roles in resisting or navigating state power during democratization.