We found a match
Your institution may have access to this item. Find your institution then sign in to continue.
- Title
‘When politics comes into play, law is no longer law’: images of collective legal consciousness in the UK, Poland and Bulgaria.
- Authors
Pirie, Fernanda; Kubal, Agnieszka; Creutzfeldt, Naomi; Hertogh, Marc; Kurkchiyan, Marina
- Abstract
This paper examines the idea of a common European legal culture by exploring its foundational component, ‘collective legal consciousness’, in three EU states: the UK, Poland and Bulgaria. Using a comparative research design and a variety of methods of data collection, it suggests that, underneath the thin layer of EU consensus, there are some fundamental differences in perceptions of law. The evidence shows that legal ideas are infused with perceptions of the political system. This finding suggests that the creation of a shared European legal culture depends on the prior formation of a common transnational polity right across the EU, together with a sense of political identity and of trust in the legitimacy of the European political authorities. The paper also demonstrates the multilayered character of collective legal consciousness, allowing different images of law to co-exist, underpinned by the perception of the source with which each image is associated.
- Subjects
LAW &; culture; IDENTITY politics; POLITICAL affiliation; POLITICAL attitudes; PRACTICAL politics
- Publication
International Journal of Law in Context, 2016, Vol 12, Issue 4, p404
- ISSN
1744-5523
- Publication type
Article
- DOI
10.1017/S1744552316000185