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News & Announcements

News!
Here is a link to CRN sessions at the upcoming meeting of the Law and Society Association/Canadian Law and Society Association, which will be held in Toronto on June 7-10, 2018. We have organized 5 paper sessions and a roundtable discussion on a variety of issues including comparative lay participation research, inequality and the jury, and the role of criminal justice actors in shaping who sits on juries and in determining what they hear. Speakers will be talking about lay participation developments in such countries as Argentina, Australia, Belgium, Canada, England and Wales, France, Georgia, Japan, Norway, Russia, Spain, and the USA, offering us a range of perspectives. And for those of you attending, please come to our business meeting (Friday 6/8, 11:45 am-12:45 pm) and plan to join us for a CRN group dinner following the conference’s opening reception on Thursday (details to follow).


Previous News/Announcements

June 20-23, 2017

International Law and Society Conference, Mexico City, Mexico

Greetings! The International Law and Society Conference in Mexico City was a huge success, with a record number of participants in a world-class location. Our IRC organized a number of sessions showcasing the latest research from around the globe on lay participation in law. The first link below lists the IRC sessions. We have also posted links to materials from the individual presentations during the conference. See you in Toronto!

Andrés Harfuch from Argentina sends in this comment and link: "We are in the final countdown towards the first trial by jury in Buenos Aires province (next Tuesday). In the meantime, this excellent report [about how 12 Angry Men is being disseminated in Argentina is airing] on Fox News Latino, which can be viewed here.


5/28/15-5/31/15: Law and Society Association annual meeting in Seattle, WA.

The Law and Society Association's preliminary program for 2015 is now available online. A big "thank you" to Mary Rose who served on the Program Committee for the conference. You can access the preliminary program here.

Our CRN on Lay Participation in Legal Decision Making is sponsoring 4 sessions. They are listed below. We will also hold a short business meeting after the last session on Thursday, 5/28, beginning around 6:45 pm. It conflicts with the start of the opening reception, but we will keep the meeting fairly short, and people who are interested can go to the reception together. Following the reception, those who are interested can go to a group dinner. If you'd like to be included in the CRN dinner, please email Sanja (kutnjak@msu.edu), so she can make the appropriate reservation.

We look forward to seeing you in Seattle! Valerie, Sanja, and Mary

1. CRN 04 Lay Participation Methods Roundtable
Fri, 5/29: 7:30 AM - 9:15 AM
3192
Roundtable Session
Friday Session 1
Westin Seattle
Room: Breakout 21
Jury scholars deploy multiple and multi-disciplinary research methods to examine lay participation in the legal process. As we follow our investigations in and out of courtrooms, judges' chambers, and lawyers' offices, our methodological approaches often require improvisation and combination. This workshop aims to expand discussions of jury research methods beyond the disciplinary boundaries that sometimes constrain them. Because of the dynamic nature of our research sites and diverse constitution of our scholarly audiences, this session offers a context within which to share reflections and ask questions of colleagues in adjacent disciplines. Drawing on illustrative research projects, panelists will offer insight into methods including conversation analysis, post-verdict survey work, quantitative studies of juror demographics, trial simulation research, an interactionist study of jury deliberation, and the ethnographic study of jury selection.

Chair: Anna Offit, Princeton

Discussant: Neil Vidmar, Duke Law School

Participant(s)

Catherine Grosso, Michigan State University College of Law
Paula Hannaford-Agor, National Center for State Courts
Margaret Kovera, John Jay College of Criminal Justice
Barbara O'Brien, Michigan State University College of Law
Anna Offit, PrincetonMeredith Rossner, London School of Economics and Political Science
David Tait, University of Western Sydney
Nicole Waters, National Center for State Courts

2. Global Jury Practices &Innovations: A Cross-Country Exchange
Fri, 5/29: 9:30 AM - 11:15 AM
3252
Paper Session
Friday Session 2
Westin Seattle
Room: Breakout 24
In keeping with this meeting's focus on the Global North and the Global South, this panel will explore "global jury practices and innovations." We will focus on several countries, from as far north as Canada and as far south as Australia, as well as countries in between, and consider their different approaches to the jury and to lay participation. We will draw examples from the Global North and the Global South to examine how a common institution, such as the jury, can develop in different ways in different places and at different times. This cross-country exchange will help the panel members to think critically about their own jury system and which practices from other countries might work well in their own jury system and which practices might be difficult to import and why.

Chair/Discussant: Nancy Marder, IIT Chicago-Kent College of Law

Presentations

Civil Jury Trials in Okinawa, Japan from 1964 to 1972 and Their Resurrection in Seeing Corporate and Governmental Accountabilities in a post-Fukushima Disaster era

Presenter

Hiroshi Fukurai, University of California Santa Cruz

The jury trial in Spain: the relevant role played by the Clerk of the Court

Presenter

Mar Jimeno-Bulnes, Universidad de Burgos

Non-Presenting Co-Author

Valerie Hans, Cornell Law School

The Problems of Lack of Native Representation on Juries in Canada: Exploring Whether A Jury of Peers Is Attainable and Strategies for Change

Presenter

Marie Comiskey, University of Toronto

The Theory and Reality of Lay Judges in Mixed Tribunals

Presenter

Sanja Kutnjak Ivkovich, Michigan State University

3. CRN 04: Challenges facing the American Jury
Fri, 5/29: 1:30 PM - 3:15 PM
4646
Paper Session
Friday Session 4
Westin Seattle
Room: Breakout 21
This session will explore challenges the jury in the United States currently faces. One challenge stems from the move away from resolving disputes by trial. We will hear from a leading legal practitioner who is undertaking a lobbying and publicity campaign (e.g., the "Save Our Juries" website) to reignite use of the jury. Another challenge is the long-standing concern about who serves on juries. Two papers will explore representativeness issues, one which examines how the small samples generated for trial venires creates small disparities that are hard to litigate;the other looks at the issue of attitudinal representation. We will also have discussion of alternatives to the jury trial.

Chair: Mary Rose, University of Texas

Discussant: Paula Hannaford-Agor, National Center for State Courts

PresentationsJuries and Attitudinal Representation

Presenter

Andrew Krebs, University of Texas at Austin

Non-Presenting Co-Author(s)
Shari Diamond, Northwestern U Law School/American Bar Foundation
Mary Rose, University of Texas

Jurors and Social Media: Is a Fair Trial Still Possible?

Presenter

Nancy Marder, IIT Chicago-Kent College of Law

Saving the Civil Jury Trial: A Review of ABOTA's Efforts

Presenter

Stephen Susman, Susman Godfrey

The Effect of Jury Service on Jurors' Trust in Police and Courts

Presenter

Liana Pennington, University of Alabama

The Power of Small Cuts: Small Group Sampling and Jury Representation

Presenter

Mary Rose, University of Texas

4. CRN 4: Listening to Lay Perspectives in Legal Systems
Fri, 5/29: 3:30 PM - 5:15 PM
6446 Paper Session
Friday Session 5
Westin Seattle
Room: Breakout 21
The papers in this session take a critical look at when the voices of lay tribunals (e.g., juries) and its members are listened to and taken seriously within the context of a broader legal system. Voices are obscured by not saying what the state or legal professionals wants to hear, or because the deliberative process is stymied by actual communication challenges.

Chair/Discussant: David Tait, University of Western Sydney

Presentations

Composition of Mixed Courts in Kazakhstan: Issues of Linguistic, Racial and Gender Representativeness

Presenter

Nikolai Kovalev, Wilfrid Laurier University

FROM ALEXANDER II TO PUTIN: THE RISE AND FALL OF RUSSIAN JURIES SINCE THE TIME OF THE CZARS

Presenter

Nazim Ziyadov, Antalya International University

Jury reform in England and Wales - unfinished business

Presenter

Penny Darbyshire, Kingston University London

Learning to judge: How Danish jurors navigate between Law and common sense during deliberation in criminal cases

Presenter

Louise Victoria Johansen, Faculty of Law

Participation in the administration of justice: Deaf citizens as jurors

Presenter

Debra Russell, University of Alberta

Co-Presenter

Jemina Napier, Heriot-Watt University

Non-Presenting Co-Author(s)
Sandra Hale, University of New South Wales
Mehera San Roque, University of New South Wales
David Spencer, Australian Catholic University

"Why States Solicit Citizen Input: The Introduction of Jury Systems in East Asia"

PresenterRieko Kage, University of Tokyo


 

CRN/IRC member Valerie Hans has been elected president of the Law and Society Association for a two-year term beginning in June 2015. Click here for the story.

5/29/14-6/1/14: Law and Society Association meeting in Minneapolis, MN.
Click here for panels and papers, Minneapolis, MN. on Lay Participation presented at 2014 Law & Society Association meeting

5/30/13-6/2/13: Law and Society Association meeting in Boston, MA.
Click here for panels and papers, Boston,MA. on Lay Participation presented at 2013 Law & Society Association meeting

6/5/12-6/8/12: International Law and Society Conference, Honolulu, Hawaii Click here for a listing of 2012 LSA panels and papers on lay participation in law

3/25/11: Popular Justice: Beyond Judges and Juries
Click here for more info

2/26/09: Takashi Maruta, Professor of Law, Kwansei Gakuin University Law School, Japan, and Visiting Scholar, Center for Japanese Legal Studies, Columbia University, Lay Participation in Legal Decision Making Comes to Japan: http://media.lawschool.cornell.edu/flashcom/misc/2009/hans_movie_feb09.html

Professor Maruta has been a major influence in the development of Japanese legal reforms, including the introduction of Saiban-in Seido, the Japanese reform in which six lay citizens and three professional judges decide serious criminal cases jointly. In his 2009 talk at Cornell, Professor Maruta discussed the law reform process that led to this particular form of citizen participation in legal decision making, and the special challenges that he and others confronted and continue to face in developing a strong and vibrant system of lay participation in Japan.

8/16/09: Foreigners size up lay judge system Citizens' willingness to serve contrasts with other nations that allow public participation: http://search.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/nn20090816a6.html

Click Here to view the 2006 International Research Collaborative Newsletter (pdf format)

Click Here to view the June 24th 2007 International Research Collaborative Newsletter (pdf format)

Click Here to view the October 1st 2007 International Research Collaborative Newsletter (pdf format)

Click Here to view the 2008 Montreal Law & Society Association Meeting (pdf format)