How Does Law Matter?: Fundamental Issues in Law and Society

The question of how law matters has long been fundamental to the law and society field. Social science scholarship has repeatedly demonstrated that law matters less, or differently, than those who study only legal doctrine would have us believe. Yet research in this field depends on a belief in the relevance of law, no matter how often gaps are identified.

These essays show how law is relevant in both an "instrumental" and a "constitutive" sense, as a tool to accomplish particular purposes a...