This week we will be focusing on the strategies people use to resolve disputes. You will see that the courts serve this function for some people, but there is a wide variety of legal and nonlegal strategies that people also use. I’m going to mention my favorite articles first because, as I mentioned in class, many of my most dearly beloved articles are scheduled for this week.
In “Going to Court” Merry reports her findings from a participant observation study in a polyethnic, urban housing project to understand how a group of people who live closely together but share a limited sense of community go about resolving conflicts. She finds that the members of this group turn to the courts as a strategy for sanctioning their neighbors rather than resolving their disputes. After reading this article, you should be able to talk about why the community members use the courts in this way and what other kinds of strategies they use to solve their disputes (and why).
In “The Oven Bird’s Song” Engle looks at the opposite type of community – a rural, tightly knit, homogenous community. Engle studies the resolution of personal injury claims and finds that the community has a distinctly different set of norms for individuals who are known members of the community (“insiders”) and those who have recently moved in and are less well known (“outsiders”). After reading this article, you should be able to articulate the two sets of norms and why Engle thinks these patterns have emerged.
Tanase’s “The Management of Disputes” and West’s “Karaoke” are both variations on a similar theme: why Japan has much lower litigation rate than the United States. Tanase looks at automobile accidents and West, of course, studies noise complaints related to karaoke. Both point out that Japan has several pre-litigation systems for resolving disputes outside of the courts. Tanase focuses on how the automobile accident disputes are handled through an institutionalized system that teaches citizens how to make use of alternative dispute resolution and also provides them with a number of resources to complete the resolution process. West argues that individuals’ decisions to make use of alternative resolutions depends on a calculation of costs and resources. If you are reading one (or both) of these articles, you should note that both reject the standard attitudinal/cultural argument (that the Japanese are simply a less litigious people). You should be able to describe the alternative to court that are identified by the author(s) and what patterns they find in regard to how disputes are settled. I would also love to know if you think these kinds of systems could work in the US. What would be the benefits/costs?
Lempert and Monsma conduct a mixed-method study (interviews and statistical analysis) of the treatment of Samoans before a housing eviction board. They find empirical evidence to support the claim that Samoans experience discrimination in financial cases. They then turn to interviews to analyze the kinds of excuses that Samoans give. While their excuses would be seen as legitimate in Samoan culture, they are seen as illegitimate in the US. If you choose this article, you should be able to describe the patterns of excuses that Samoans give and why they are not accepted in the US. Also, I will want to know if you agree with Lempert and Monsma that this pattern constitutes “cultural discrimination.” Is this kind of discrimination one that you find acceptable or not? Explain.
I went over the basic findings of the Galanter article, so I don’t plan to re-hash the findings on how few complaints actually go to trial here. If you choose this article, I would like for you to summarize and comment on some aspect of the article beyond what I gave you in class. It is quite long, so you can probably skim over the findings regarding litigiousness to look for other kinds of information.
Lind, et al. conduct interviews with almost 1000 individuals who were recently fired or laid off. They ask respondents about both the situation surrounding their job loss and their feelings about their termination. They then follow up with their subjects 4 months later to find out how they are still thinking/feeling about their job loss. While they consider several possible explanations, Lind and colleagues argue that the most compelling theoretical perspective is the relational model of organizational justice. Explain this theory. What findings support this theory? What do Lind and colleagues recommend regarding termination strategies for employers?
Mullis’ article on medical malpractice uses Black’s theory of social control to explain patterns in malpractice suits. After reading this article, you should be able to summarize Black’s theory of social control and at least 2-3 reasons that Mullis believes this theory effectively explains the “American malpractice experience.”
May and Stengel apply the naming-blaming-claiming model to a study of patients who sue their doctors. They especially look at clients’ decisions NOT to take legal action against their doctors. They identify 5 patterns of response (from “lumping it” to hiring a lawyer but then deciding not to sue) and explain these patterns based on 5 independent variables (audiences, parties, strategic interaction, seriousness of injury, and resources). What to do they find? What surprises you?
Harrington and Merry conduct a study of mediators to understand this form of alternative dispute resolution. This article is, in my opinion, densely theoretical but also very interesting. You may especially like this article if you are interested in the social construction of reality perspective in sociology. Harrington and Merry analyze the ways that mediators and mediation organizations “make” (construct) mediation by employing different ideological frames and strategically choosing which mediators to use to handle cases. Harrington and Merry argue that while there are disputes within the field of mediation over what mediation is all about, these groups actually have a lot in common. After reading this article, you should be able to talk about what various groups of mediators disagree on and have in common.