Herbert Jacob

The Elusive Shadow of the Law

This article explores the conditions which lead to variation in the degree to which law affects private negotiations? It is an extension and modification of Mnookin and Kornhausers (1979) formulation that negotiations occur in the shadow of the law. Drawing on prior research on disputes, I hypothesize that this effect depends on the way a claim is framed (which in turn is affected by the claimants gender), on the mode of attorney involvement, and on claimant use of informational networks. I examine these hypotheses by an analysis of a small sample of recently divorced men and women who were interviewed about the negotiations that led to their custody and child-support arrangements.

Presidential Address: Trial Courts in the United States: The Travails of Exploration

This paper examines the last 12 years of research on trial courts. It focuses on three shortcomings of that research. The first is a failure to examine distributional questions about what kinds of benefits and sanctions are apportioned to which members of American society as well as the place of adjudication in the course of dispute processing. The second shortcoming is a failure to integrate the various theoretical perspectives which have won widespread acceptance. The third is an undue concentration on comparative designs to the neglect of longitudinal analyses within single jurisdictions.

Another Look at No-Fault Divorce and the Post-Divorce Finances of Women

Recent studies by Weitzman (1985) and Peters (1986) suggest that no-fault divorce has harmed women. The research presented here tests these findings by examining the effects of no-fault divorce on the financial situation of women using data on salary and wage income, home ownership, and child support from the National Longitudinal Surveys (NLS) of Labor Market Experience (Ohio State University Center for Human Resource Research [OSU], 1986) young womens cohort. The analyses do not support the hypothesis that nofault divorce produces adverse financial effects. Rather, it appears that no-fault has had little effect on womens finances. Alternative models that might explain how divorce law affects the financial condition of women are suggested.

The Governance of Trial Judges

The role of the bench as the sponsoring organization of trial judges largely remains a mystery to political science. Borrowing from organizational theory the metaphor of loose coupling, a characteristic of many American political institutions, this article explores the tension between elements of loose and tight coupling within the sponsoring organization of judges (the bench) and the consequences of that tension for the distribution of services to clients of trial courts. The article identifies three sets of consequences: (1) The locus and style of innovation is acutely circumscribed by these tensions; in the court that is studied, assertive leadership and punctuated change are less likely than conciliar leadership and incremental change. (2) The juxtaposition of loosely and tightly coupled elements promote responsiveness to powerful clientele interests. (3) Responsiveness to powerful clientele interests leads to a distribution of resources that short-changes less influential clients of the court.