Editorial Type:
Article Category: Research Article
| Online Publication Date: 08 Oct 2014
Differential Participation in Professional Activism: The Case of the Guantánamo Habeas Lawyers
Differential Participation in Professional Activism: The Case of the Guantánamo Habeas Lawyers
Page Range: 287 – 307
Scholars of social movements tend to regard professionals as a homogeneous group whose activism plays a secondary role in mobilization processes. In this article, I focus on activism driven by professionals themselves and therein examine how heterogeneous professionals participate in their activism. Drawing on the case of the Guantánamo habeas lawyers, I utilize a two-step methodology to investigate the factors that contribute to the differential participation of legal professionals. The first stage of analysis shows that while lawyers with higher status played a critical role in initiating professional activism under a hostile environment, the Rasul v. Bush ruling opened up a legal opportunity for lawyers with lower status to participate in activism. In the second stage, social network analyses of the lawyers' collaborative structure reveal that movement-affiliated lawyers played a bridging role that coordinated initiators and latecomers. The results have important implications for understanding professionals' participation in contentious politics.
Albiston, Catherine R., and Laura Beth Nielsen. 2013. "Funding the Cause: How Public Interest Law Organizations Fund Their Activities and Why It Matters for Social Change." Law and Social Inquiry 39(1): 62-95.
Andersen, Ellen Ann. 2006. Out of the Closets and into the Court. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press.
Blanc, Florent. 2010. "Dissent after September 11: Mobilization of Librarians, ACLU, Cities and Lawyers." PhD dissertation, Department of Political Science, Northwestern University, Evanston, IL.
Borgatti, Steve P., Martin G. Everett, and Linton C. Freeman. 2002. Ucinet for Windows: Software for Social Network Analysis. Cambridge, MA: Analytic Technologies.
Bourdieu, Pierre. 1987. "The Force of Law: Toward a Sociology of the Juridical Field." Hastings Law Journal 38: 814-53.
Boutcher, Steven A. 2010. "Mobilizing in the Shadow of the Law: Lesbian and Gay Rights in the Aftermath of Bowers v. Hardwick." Research in Social Movements, Conflict and Change 31: 175-205.
Boutcher, Steven A. 2013. "Lawyering for Social Change: Pro Bono Publico, Cause Lawyering, and the Social Movement Society" Mobilization 18(2): 179-196.
Brown, Anna J., Matthew W. Daloisio, Michael S. Foley, Patrick Stanley, and Matthew Vogel. 2008. Witness Against Torture: The Campaign to Shut Down Guantanamo. Bronx, NY: Yellow Bike Press.
Brown-Nagin, Tomiko. 2005. "Elites, Social Movements, and the Law: The Case of Affirmative Action." Columbia Law Review 1436: 1-83.
Bureau of Labor Statistics. 2011. Occupational Outlook Handbook. Washington, DC. Retrieved April 19, 2011 ( http://www.bls.gov/oco/ocos053.htm
Burstein, Paul. 1991. "Legal Mobilization as a Social Movement Tactic: The Struggle for Equal Employment Opportunity." American Journal of Sociology 96(5): 1201-25.
Burt, Ronald. 1992. Structural Holes: The Social Structure of Competition. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
Center for Constitutional Rights. 2007. Lead Petitioners' Counsel in Guantánamo Habeas Cases. Retrieved August 7, 2012 ( http://www.webcitation.org/
Center for Constitutional Rights. 2008. Annual Report. New York, NY. Retrieved August 7, 2012 ( http://ccrjustice.org/files/CCR_Annual_Report_2008.pdf
Center for Constitutional Rights. 2013. Center for Constitutional Rights Webpage. New York, NY. Retrieved Jun 10, 2013 ( http://ccrjustice.org/ourcases/past-cases/rasul-bush
Cole, David. 2003. Enemy Aliens: Double Standard and Constitutional Freedoms in the War on Terrorism. New York: The New Press.
Coleman, James S., Elihu Katz, and Herbert Menzel. 1966. Medical Innovation: A Diffusion Study. New York: Bobbs Merrill.
Corrigall-Brown, Catherine. 2012. Patterns of Protest: Trajectories of Participation in Social Movements. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press.
De Fazio, Gianluca. 2012. "Legal Opportunity Structure and Social Movement Strategy in Northern Ireland and Southern United States." International Journal of Comparative Sociology 53(1): 3-22.
Deflem, Mathieu. 2008. Sociology of Law: Visions of a Scholarly Tradition. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.
Denbeaux, Mark P., and Jonathan Hafetz, eds. 2009. The Guantánamo Lawyers. New York: New York University Press.
Diani, Mario. 2003. "Networks and Social Movements: A Research Programme." Pp. 299-319 in Social Movements and Networks: Relational Approaches to Collective Action, edited by Mario Diani and Doug McAdam. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press.
Donald, Mark. 2006. "The Guantanamo Bar Association: Texas Habeas Team Takes on the Government in Detainee Case." Texas Lawyer, January 23. Retrieved January 1, 2013 (http://www.kuwaitifreedom.org/media/pdf/Texas%20Lawyer%20January%2023,%202006.pdf). http://www.kuwaitifreedom.org/media/pdf/Texas%20Lawyer%20January%2023,%202006.pdf
Eisinger, Peter K. 1973. "The Conditions of Protest Behavior in American Cities." American Political Science Review 67(1): 11-28.
Fisher, Dana R., and Paul-Brian McInerney. 2012. "The Limits of Networks in Social Movement Retention: On Canvassers and Their Careers." Mobilization 17(2): 109-128.
Fletcher, Laurel E., Alexis Kelly, and Zulaikha Aziz. 2011. "Defending the Rule of Law: Reconceptualizing Guantánamo Habeas Attorneys." Connecticut Law Review 44(3): 617-73.
Gamson, William A. 1990. The Strategy of Social Protest. 2nd ed. Belmont, CA: Wadsworth.
Giugni, Marco G. 1998. "Was It Worth the Effort? The Outcomes and Consequences of Social Movements." Annual Review of Sociology 24: 371-93.
Giugni, Marco G. 2004. "Personal and Biographical Consequences." Pp.489-507 in The Blackwell Companion to Social Movements, edited by David A. Snow, Sarah A. Soule, and Hanspeter Kriesi. Malden, MA: Blackwell.
Givan, Rebecca Kolins, Kenneth Roberts, and Sarah Soule. 2010. The Diffusion of Social Movements: Actors, Mechanisms, and Political Effect. New York: Cambridge University Press.
Gleeson, Shannon. 2009. "From Rights to Claims: The Role of Civil Society in Making Rights Real for Vulnerable Workers." Law and Society Review 43(3): 669-700.
Gould, Roger. 1995. Insurgent Identities: Class, Community, and Protest in Paris from 1848 to the Commune. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Gould, Roger. 2003. "Why Do Networks Matter? Rationalist and Structuralist Interpretations." Pp.233-257 in Social Movements and Networks: Relational Approaches to Collective Action, edited by Mario Diani and Doug McAdam. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press.
Granovetter, Mark. 1973. "The Strength of Weak Ties." American Journal of Sociology 78(6): 1360-80.
Granovetter, Mark. 1978. "Threshold Models of Collective Behavior." American Journal of Sociology 83(6): 1420-43.
Hajjar, Lisa. 2010. "Lawyers, Litigation and the US Anti-Torture Campaign." Presented at the Annual Meeting of the American Political Science Association, September 2, Washington, D. C.
Haltom, William. 1998. Reporting on the Courts: How Mass Media Report Judicial Actions. Chicago, IL: Nelson-Hall Publishers.
Han, Shin-Kap. 2009. "The Other Ride of Paul Revere: The Brokerage Role in the Making of the American Revolution." Mobilization 14(2): 143-162.
Hanneman, Robert A., and Mark Riddle. 2005. Introduction to Social Network Methods. Riverside, CA: University of California, Riverside. Retrieved April 10, 2013 (http://faculty.ucr.edu/~hanneman/) http://faculty.ucr.edu/~hanneman/
Hegland, Corine. 2006. "Guantánamo Bay Bar." National Journal, March 18. Retrieved April 10, 2013 (http://www.kuwaitifreedom.org/media/pdf/National%20Journal%20March%2018,%202006.pdf) http://www.kuwaitifreedom.org/media/pdf/National%20Journal%20March%2018,%202006.pdf
Heaney, Michael T., and Fabio Rojas. 2008. "Coalition Dissolution, Mobilization, and Network Dynamics in the U. S. Antiwar Movement." Research in Social Movements, Conflicts and Changes 28: 39-82.
Heinz, John P., and Edward O. Laumann. 1982. Chicago Lawyers: The Social Structure of the Bar. New York: Russell Sage Foundation and American Bar Association.
Heinz, John P., Robert L. Nelson, Rebecca L. Sandefur, and Edward O. Laumann. 2005. Urban Lawyers: The New Social Structure of the Bar. Chicago, IL: The University of Chicago Press.
Heinz, John P., Anthony Paik, and Ann Southworth. 2003. "Lawyers for Conservative Causes: Clients, Ideology, and Social Distance. Law and Society Review 37(1): 5-50.
Hilson, Chris. 2002. "New Social Movements: the Role of Legal Opportunity." Journal of European Public Policy 9(2): 238-55.
Julian, Finn, and Julie Tate. 2013. "Guantanamo Bay Detainees' Frustrations Simmering, Lawyers and Others Say." Washington Post, March 16. Retrieved Jun 10, 2013 (http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/guantanamo-detainees-frustrations-simmering-lawyers-and-others-say/2013/03/16/47fc4c0e-8d9a-11e2-b63f-f53fb9f2fcb4_story.html). http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/guantanamo-detainees-frustrations-simmering-lawyers-and-others-say/2013/03/16/47fc4c0e-8d9a-11e2-b63f-f53fb9f2fcb4_story.html
Keck, Thomas M. 2009. "Beyond Backlash: Assessing the Impact of Judicial Decisions on LGBT Rights." Law and Society Review 43(1): 151-186.
Klandermans, Bert. 1997. The Social Psychology of Protest. Oxford, UK: Blackwell.
Klandermans, Bert, and Dirk Oegema. 1987. "Potentials, Networks, Motivations, and Barriers: Steps toward Participation in Social Movements." American Sociological Review 52(4): 519-31.
Kohn, Richard H. 2009. "The Danger of Militarization in an Endless "War" on Terrorism." Journal of Military History 73(1): 177-208.
Kroenig, Matthew, and Jay Stowsky. 2006. "War Makes the State, but Not as It Pleases: Homeland Security and American Anti-Statism." Security Studies 15(4): 225-70.
Lasswell, Harold. 1941. "The Garrison State." American Journal of Sociology 46(4): 455-68.
Laumann, Edward O., and Peter V. Marsden. 1979. "The Analysis of Oppositional Structures in Political Elites: Identifying Collective Actors." American Sociological Review 44(5): 713-32.
Leicht, Kevin T., and Mary L. Fennell. 1997. "The Changing Organizational Context of Professional Work." Annual Review of Sociology 23: 215-31.
Margulies, Joseph. 2006. Guantánamo and the Abuse of Presidential Power. New York: Simon and Schuster Paperbacks.
McAdam, Doug. 1982. Political Process and the Development of Back Insurgency, 1930-1970. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
McAdam, Doug. 1986. "Recruitment to High Risk Activism: The Case of Freedom Summer." American Journal of Sociology 92(1): 64-90.
McAdam, Doug, and Dieter Rucht. 1993. "The Cross-National Diffusion of Movement Ideas." Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science 528(1): 56-74.
McAdam, Doug, Sidney Tarrow, and Charles Tilly. 2001. Dynamics of Contention. Cambridge, MA: Cambridge University Press.
McCann, Michael W. 1994. Rights at Work: Pay Equity Reform and the Politics of Legal Mobilization. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
McCann, Michael W. 2006. "Law and Social Movements: Contemporary Perspectives." Annual Review of Law and Social Science 2: 17-38.
McCarthy, John D., and Mayer N. Zald. 1973. The Trend of Social Movements in America: Professionalization and Resource Mobilization. Morristown, NJ: General Learning Press.
McCarthy, John D., and Mayer N. Zald. 1977. "Resource Mobilization and Social Movements: A Partial Theory." American Journal of Sociology 82(6): 1212-41.
McPherson, Miller, Lynn Smith-Lovin, and James M. Cook. 2001. "Birds of a Feather: Homophily in Social Networks." Annual Review of Sociology 27: 415-44.
Meyer, David S. 2004. "Protest and Political Opportunities." Annual Review of Sociology 30: 125-145.
Meyer, David S., and Steven A. Boutcher. 2007. "Signal and Spillover: Brown v. Board of Education and Other Social Movements." Perspectives on Politics 5(1): 81-93.
Meyer, David S., and Catherine Corrigall-Brown. 2005. "Coalitions and Political Context: U. S. Movements against Wars in Iraq." Mobilization 19(3): 327-46.
Meyer, David S., and Debra C. Minkoff. 2004. "Conceptualizing Political Opportunity." Social Forces 82(4): 1457-92.
Meyer, David S., and Sidney Tarrow, eds. 1998. The Social Movement Society. Lanham, MD: Rowman and Littlefield Publishers.
NeJaime, Douglas. 2011. "Winning through Losing." Iowa Law Review 96: 941-1012.
Paik, Anthony, John P. Heinz, and Ann Southworth. 2011. "Political Lawyers: The Structure of a National Network." Law and Social Inquiry 36(4): 892-918.
Piven, Frances Fox, and Richard A. Cloward. 1977. Poor People's Movements: Why They Succeed, How They Fail. New York: Pantheon Books.
Polletta, Francesca. 2000. "The Structural Context of Novel Rights Claims: Southern Civil Rights Organizing, 1961-1966." Law and Society Review 34(2): 367-406.
Posner, Richard, and Adrian Vermeule. 2005. "Accommodating Emergencies." Pp 55-94 in The Constitution in Wartime: Beyond Alarmism and Complacency, edited by Mark Tushnet. Durham, NC: Duke University Press.
Prabhat, Devyani. 2011. "After 9/11: Guantánamo and the Mobilization of Lawyers." Studies in Law, Politics, and Society 54: 213-59.
Rasul v. Bush. 2004. No. 03-334. Retrieved June 10, 2012 ( http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/scripts/getcase.pl?court=US&vol=000&invol=03-334
Ratner, Michael. 2007. "Litigating Guantanamo." Pp 201-12 in International Prosecution of Human Right Crime, edited by Wolfgang Kaleck, Michael Ratner, Tobias Singelnstein, and Peter Weiss. New York: Springer.
Reprieve. 2013. Webpage. Retrieved June 10, 2013 ( http://www.reprieve.org.uk/clivestaffordsmith/
Rosenberg, Gerald N. 1991. The Hollow Hope: Can Courts Bring About Social Changes? Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Rosenberg, Gerald N. 1992. "Hollow Hopes and Other Aspirations: A Reply to Feeley and McCann." Law and Society Inquiry 17(4): 761-78.
Rucht, Dieter. 2004. "Movement Allies, Adversaries, and Third Parties." Pp. 197-216 in The Blackwell Companion to Social Movements, edited by David A. Snow, Sarah A. Soule, and Hanspeter Kriesi. Malden, MA: Blackwell Publishing.
Rucht, Dieter, and Friedhelm Neidhardt. 2002. "Towards a ‘Movement Society’? On the Possibilities of Institutionalizing Social Movements." Social Movement Studies 1(1): 7-30.
Sarat, Austin, and Stuart A. Scheingold, eds. 2006. Cause Lawyers and Social Movements. Palo Alto, CA: Stanford University Press.
Saunders, Clare, Maria Grasso, Cristiana Olcese, Emily Rainsford, and Christopher Rootes. 2012. "Explaining Differential Protest Participation: Novices, Returners, Repeaters, and Stalwarts." Mobilization 17(3): 263-80.
Scheingold, Stuart A., and Austin Sarat. 2005. Something to Believe In: Politics, Professionalism, and Cause Lawyering. Palo Alto, CA: Stanford University Press.
Schussman, Alan, and Sarah A. Soule. 2005. "Process and Protest: Accounting for Individual Protest Participation." Social Forces 84(2): 1083-1108.
Seton Hall University School of Law. 2007. "Guantánamo Bay Bar Association." Newark, NJ. Retrieved on August 30, 2012 ( http://web.archive.org/web/20070810014117/http://law.shu.edu/Guantánamoteachin/page8.htm
Sidel, Mark. 2007. More Secure Less Free? Antiterrorrism Policy after September 11. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press.
Southworth, Ann, Anthony Paik, and John P. Heinz. 2011. "Lawyers in National Policymaking." Pp 220-42 in The Paradox of Professionalism: Lawyers and the Possibility of Justice, edited by Scott L. Cummings. New York: Cambridge University Press.
Strang, David, and John Meyer. 1993. "Institutional Conditions for Diffusion." Theory and Society 22(4): 487-511.
Sullivan, Stacy. 2006. "The Minutes of the Guantánamo Bay Bar Association." New York Magazine, June 26. Retrieved June 10, 2013 (http://nymag.com/news/features/17337/, Jun 26). http://nymag.com/news/features/17337/
Tarrow, Sidney. 1998. Power in Movement: Social Movements and Contentious Politics. 3rd edition. New York: Cambridge University Press.
Tarrow, Sidney. 2005. The New Transnational Activism. Cambridge, MA: Cambridge University Press.
Tarrow, Sidney. 2010. "Dynamics of Diffusion: Mechanisms, Institutions, and Scale Shift." Pp. 204-19 in The Diffusion of Social Movements: Actors, Mechanisms, and Political Effects, edited by Rebecca Kolins Givan, Kenneth Roberts, and Sarah Soule. New York: Cambridge University Press.
Tarrow, Sidney. 2012. Strangers at the Gates: Movements and States in Contentious Politics. New York: Cambridge University Press.
The Talking Dog. 2013. "TD Blog Interview with Michael Mone, April 13." Retrieved June 10, 2013 ( http://www.thetalkingdog.com/archives2/001686.html
Tilly, Charles. 1978. From Mobilization to Revolution. New York: McGraw-Hill.
Tilly, Charles. 1995. Popular Contention in Great Britain, 1758-1834. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
U. S. District Court for the District of Columbia. 2002. Rasul v. Bush Petition for Writ of Habeas Corpus. Washington, D. C. Retrieved August 7, 2012 ( http://news.findlaw.com/hdocs/docs/terrorism/rasulbush021902pet.html
Vanhala, Lisa. 2012. "Legal Opportunity Structures and the Paradox of Legal Mobilization by the Environmental Movement in the UK." Law and Society Review 46(3): 523-56.
Vasi, Ion Bogdan. 2011. "Brokerage, Miscibility, and the Spread of Contention." Mobilization 16(1): 11-24.
Verba, Sidney. Kay Lehman Schlozman, and Henry E. Brady. 1995. Voice and Equality: Civic Voluntarism in American Politics. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
Wasserman, Stanley, and Katherine Faust. 1994. Social Network Analysis: Methods and Application. Cambridge, England: Cambridge University Press.
Zald, Mayer N., and John D. McCarthy 1987. Social Movements in an Organizational Society: Collected Essays. New Brunswick, NJ: Transaction Publishers.