This thesis examines gender differentiation in prosecutions for minor offences in local secular and ecclesiastical courts in Kent from 1460 to 1560. Chapter one explains the need for research on gender and crime in local courts, and for studies bridging the historiographical gap between medieval and early modem England. Chapter two examines crimes against property, arguing that reasons other than gender may explain the apparent lenience towards female thieves. Women were disproportionately prosecuted for small thefts and peripheral offences like hedgebreaking and receiving: this could indicate, not that they lacked initiative, but that they were more likely to be prosecuted for offences which were overlooked when committed by men. The reverse appears to be true for physical violence, the subject of chapter three. Here the evidence suggests that men were charged for very minor assaults, whereas minor violence by women was only prosecuted in special circumstances. Almost equal numbers of men and women were prosecuted for verbal offences, the subject of chapter four, but the women were accused mainly of scolding or quarrelling with their social equals, and the men of insulting or slandering their social superiors. Chapter five deals with prosecutions for sexual misconduct. Thechurch courts were relatively lenient towards females accused of fornication or adultery-, both ecclesiastical and secular jurisdictions, however, prosecuted `bawds', who were mainly female, and prostitutes, but rarely the men who used their services. Chapter six is concerned with alleged sorcerers (mainly women), and with sabbath breakers, illegal games-players and vagabonds (largely men). The concluding chapter discusses the similarity of the policies of the ecclesiastical and secular courts, and the tendency for charges against women to be vague and generalised while those against men were specific. It then focuses on the different crimes for which men and women were typically presented, particularly sexual and verbal offences for women and physical assault for men. These and other gendered offences reflect contemporary assumptions and fears about femininity and masculinity: women were expected to be quarrelsome, malicious gossips and sexual delinquents, while physical violence was expected and feared in men. It is suggested that the way local courts exercised their considerable discretion over what, and whom, to prosecute reflected and reinforced these preconceptions, and operated both to control women and to minimise men's fears about them.

In recent years, Malawi has received global attention as a global hotspot for human rights violations based on sexual orientation and gender identity since the arrest of Tiwonge Chimbalanga and Steven Monjeza for holding a wedding ceremony in 2009. The violations are a result of negative attitudes against ‘homosexuality’, and the application of anti-gay provisions of the Penal Code and the Marriages Divorce and Family Relations Act, which outlaw consensual adult same-sex relationships and non-conforming gender identities. Malawi’s failure to protect queer persons amounts to the violation of its domestic and international human rights obligations. Paradoxically, the Malawian Constitution and international human rights obligations (to which Malawi subscribes), guarantee equal and effective protection against discrimination, which I have argued that it includes discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity. This interdisciplinary study explores the life stories of 44 queer Malawians examining how the lack of human rights protection affects their daily lives. I have found that the majority of queer Malawians are unlikely to come out due to fear of stigma and discrimination. As a result, they are unable to claim the full status necessary to enable them to formally assert their identity, citizenship and relationship rights. Drawing from social construction theories, this study will show that local meanings regarding human rights and sexuality include a misinterpretation of SOGI-based human rights as ‘the right to conduct mathanyula’, which is locally (mis)understood to imply permission to engage in sexual activities between men and young boys. I have recommended a radical shift in the articulation of SOGI-based human rights so that it is understood as the equal entitlement to protections in accordance with Malawi’s domestic and international human rights obligations. If understood as the latter, Malawians are likely to endorse human rights protection based on sexual orientation and gender identity.

O presente trabalho tem por objetivo demonstrar como o direito, ao passo em que exerce função essencial como instrumento de dominação entre classes sociais, apresenta-se também como importante instrumento de resistência política da classe trabalhadora. Tal importância ultrapassa a simples efetividade das normas no campo jurídico e ganha especial relevância na forma como se traduzem juridicamente as lutas de classes, o que faz com que as reivindicações políticas transformadas em direitos, por mais que em grande medida se neutralizem de acordo com os interesses hegemônicos, permaneçam no horizonte político da sociedade, alimentando a tensão por transformação social. Para tanto, este trabalho percorre um itinerário teórico dividido em três movimentos. Inicialmente, estuda a forma como se constitui e complexifica a noção de ideologia nas obras de Karl Marx, desde as obras iniciais até sua reflexão mais madura. O segundo movimento é dedicado a localizar o papel exercido pelo direito no conjunto da ideologia social e indaga as possibilidades de uma teoria da ideologia jurídica. Em seu terceiro e último movimento, a fim de demonstrar concretamente a problemática da tese, dedica-se à investigação da relação entre ambiguidade e resistência no caso dos direitos sociais, em especial os direitos dos trabalhadores previstos na Constituição brasileira de 1988, cuja vigência se dá sob forte pressão neoliberal. Neste passo, aproveita-se fartamente do diálogo com a sociologia crítica do trabalho contemporânea, no intuito de verificar como as lutas concretas dos trabalhadores transitam entre o direito, a política e a ideologia. / The present work intends to show how law plays not only an essential function as an instrument of domination between social classes, but it is also an important element of working class political resistance. This importance exceeds the rules established in the juridical field and reaches special relevance in the way that it translates class struggles, what makes political claims turned into rights, in spite of the fact that its large measure could be neutralized according to hegemonic interests, remaining on the societys political surface, feeding the social transformation tension. This work follows a theoretical line divided in three movements. Firstly, it studies the way that ideological notion in Karl Marxs work is established and complexified, since the beginning of his works until the most mature ideas developed by him. The second movement intends to find the role played by law in the social ideological field questioning the possibilities of a juridical ideologys theory. The third and last movement, is developed with the main intention to show effectively what this thesis is all about, it also proposes an investigation on the relations between ambiguity and resistance in social rights case, mainly based on workers rights provided in 1988s Brazilian Constitution under the neoliberal pressure. In this sense the discourse of the contemporary critical sociology of work is widely used, aiming to verify how real working class fights flows through the law, politics and ideology.

The story of indigenous peoples’ knowledge systems, also known as indigenous knowledge (hereafter IK), is a complex one tangled with different and sometimes conflicting interests, values, and interpretations from a variety of disciplines, or specialized fields. A number of international treaty and trade agreements that want to ‘harness’ IK also turned it into an object of global governance, as this PhD study argues. This study also argues that the well-being of IK has gradually emerged as a global agenda for sustainable development and intergenerational justice, which constitute the defining characteristics of contemporary discourse of heritage. Consequently, IK issues and debates have become more versatile and multifaceted with a widening scope and mounting stakes. This is a sociological and legal study of knowledge that analyses the epistemological struggle resulting from different understandings of the nature and purpose of IK, which has causal relationship with the inadequacies of the governing regimes documented in this study. This study argues that such struggle and inadequacy form the core problem for IK governance. Furthermore, this study takes a novel approach guided by indigenous peoples’ epistemology, which represents ties between ecology, landscape, and people in a web of connections, to argue that IK is a cross-cutting subject and a form of emplaced knowledge. Hence it is not simply a property issue or debate as most literature tends to focus on. This study further argues that what constitutes the cornerstone of IK claims by indigenous peoples is essentially biocultural diversity that nurtured and sustained IK as well as IK-holder communities as distinct peoples. Through an interdisciplinary approach of synergy and synthesis, this study developed a number of original ideas and frameworks to analyse this complex story of IK. By doing so, this study shows how IK is a challenging subject that is inevitably political; it is also tangled with inherently heterogenetic and incoherent regimes of governance, from intellectual property and trade to environmental governance and development to natural and cultural heritage and human rights. This study takes these regimes as sites of inquiry in the tradition of critical theory to further unpack and problematize the development imperative and the private-property-based system exercised by these regimes. Finally, this study concludes that IK governance can make or break vulnerable groups like indigenous peoples to a point of prosperity or deeper poverty and extinction. Therefore, it requires particular care with an integrated approach. This study aims to fill an important gap in the literature with recommendations for future policy and research.

No description available.

Thesis advisor: C. Shawn . McGuffey / Thesis advisor: Zine . Magubane / This dissertation analyzes the impact of U.S. law on women of color at home and abroad, as well as the ways in which women of color respond to and resist U.S. law. In their resistance, they challenge the domestic failings of the U.S. criminal justice system as well as the systems which connect state violence internationally. The first article of this project explores the space of the sentencing hearing as a site for rhetorically reclaiming Black motherhood in the face of its pathologization. I use the case of Marissa Alexander to show how the defendant and her family resist the exclusionary politics of legal protection. The second article examines the relationship between police militarization and strategies of black digital resistance and theorizes Black Lives Matter as a cyborg feminist social movement that can serve as a base for a global, intersectional resistance against systems of state violence. The third article challenges the dominant narrative of liberal imperialism in the U.S. anti-human trafficking project which positions U.S. as sole capable leader in the fight against “modern-day slavery” and the liberation of poor women of color in the global South and East. Though each article employs a slightly different framework, my dissertation is grounded in a qualitative sociological approach to content analysis and is informed by interdisciplinary concepts from legal studies and critical rhetorical approaches. My research centers multiple feminisms, including Critical Race Feminism, cyborg feminism, and postcolonial legal feminism, and incorporates important scholarship on technology and social movements. In this project, I demonstrate affinity between feminist theoretical approaches. More broadly, I contribute to bodies of research that challenge the notion that institutions such as the criminal justice system, digital spaces, and humanitarian aid are designed to protect and provide remedies for victims of domestic and state sponsored violence. I propose framework of feminisms in dialogue for both analyzing and resisting the hegemony of U.S. law which legitimizes and reproduces interlocking systems of racism, sexism, and imperialism. / Thesis (PhD) — Boston College, 2019. / Submitted to: Boston College. Graduate School of Arts and Sciences. / Discipline: Sociology.

The aim of this study was to explore how social workers interpret the part of the Swedish social services act that regulates each municipality’s responsibility of the people staying in it. The study’s general methodological approach connects to sociology of law. The research questions were: (1) What factors are considered important by the social workers in assessments of responsible municipality? (2) Are there variations in the assessments of responsible municipality and in that case; how can the variations be explained? (3) What discretion do the social workers consider that they have in assessments of responsible municipality? Previous studies have found considerable differences in professional social work assessments in Sweden. 69 social workers completed a questionnaire which included two vignettes. The selection maintained the emergency social services for well above 4 million citizens. Many factors were considered important in assessments of responsible municipality; the most prominent of those was the physical presence in the municipality. Variations appeared especially regarding long-term decisions and could partially be explained by which factors were considered important. The law that regulates the area of interest is a detailed legislation. However, some explanation could be found in Lipskys (2010) theory of Street-level bureaucracy.

Peace bonds are a legal tool of governance dating back to 13th c. England. In Canada, a significant change in the application of peace bonds took place in the mid-1990s, shifting their purpose from governing minor disputes between individuals to allowing for persons who have not been charged with a crime to be governed as if they had. Given the legal test for a peace bond has always been the determination of ‘reasonable fear’, the advent of these ‘specialized’ peace bonds suggests that the object of reasonable fear has changed. Despite their lengthy history, peace bonds have limited coverage in academic literature, a weakness compounded by a predominant doctrinal approach based in a liberal framework. The central inquiry of this thesis moves beyond this predominant perspective of ‘peace bonds as crime prevention’ by developing a governmental criminology, which deepens our understanding of the role of specialized peace bond law in contemporary society. Specifically, governmental criminology takes a Foucaultian critical legal studies approach, which acknowledges legal pluralism and sets out the historical context required for analysis. Ultimately, by unearthing underlying social, economic, and political power relations it is possible to critique the accompanying modes of calculation of fear and risk, thus challenging the regimes of practices that make specialized peace bonds possible. Specialized peace bonds merely manage the consequences of a criminal justice system limited by social, political, and economic circumstances, in a broader biopolitical project of integrating risky populations.

This thesis aims to evaluate the Turkish Labour Law on the basis of a new approach to legal studies that follow the internal tendency of legal science to resolve its own problem, which is that of convincingly defining the point of contact between norm and fact (form and content), materially connecting the juridical organisation of power with the social structuring of power, while avoiding both formalist and positivist deviations. Against this background, the thesis aims to assess the correlation between the recent changes in the international division of labour and the structural forms, on the axis of which the Turkish legal system functions. This endeavour includes an attempt to view law in its location as a component to a general and persistent process of social regulation that secures general patterns of social domination. This study argues that the role of the collective labour law over the stabilisation of wage relations is increasingly deteriorated by the changing nature of the state and of work, including the new institutionality and the increasing influence of business over labour politics. After the &lsquo / discovery&rsquo / of the importance of the universal principle of the freedom of contract in labour law, the regulatory powers of individual labour law have extended to the realm of capital-labour relations having an impact over the social division of labour and have acquired a relative dominance.

abstract: Over the past decades, Colombian society has endured the impact of a longstanding political conflict among different actors and outrageous expressions of violence, especially among left wing guerrillas, right wing paramilitary groups and the state government. Drawing on socio-legal studies in transitional justice and human rights, this research attempts to analyze the recent experience of transitional justice in Colombia. The main purpose of this research is to understand how political, institutional and social actors, especially the government, the courts, the human rights and transitional justice NGOs, and victims associations, frame the mechanisms of transitional justice and use legal instruments to transform the conflict and reach what they consider "justice." It also attempts to understand the relations between politics and law in the context of a hegemonic discourse of security and give account of the expressions of resistance of human rights networks. In doing so, this research advances theory on literature about law and society and transitional justice by means of applying and expanding the theoretical framework of socio-legal research via the process of transitional justice in Colombia. The dissertation presents information gathered in the field in Colombia between July 2009 and July 2010 through a qualitative research design based on document analysis and in-depth interviews with members of different international and domestic human rights organizations, victims' organizations and national institutions. The research explains how these organizations combined political and legal actions in order to contest a project of security, and more specifically a project of impunity that came from negotiations with the paramilitary groups. The research also explains how the human rights networks not only mobilized internationally to gain political support from the international community, but also how these organizations contributed to transform the political debate about victims' rights. The research also explains how the human rights organizations and victims' groups articulated the global discourse on human rights and the local and domestic meanings constructed by the emerging movements of victims. Finally, the research analyses the relevance of legal practices consisting on strategic use of law in order to protect the victims of human rights violations. / Dissertation/Thesis / Ph.D. Justice Studies 2011