Work

Governmental influence over rights consciousness: public perceptions of the COVID‐19 lockdown

Year: 2024

Type: article

Abstract: A focus on rights consciousness has become a mainstay of the socio‐legal study of law in everyday life. Such research, much of it critical in orientation, generally uses people's sense of grievance as its starting point. The consequent risk is that we elide rights consciousness with a sense of injustice. This article argues that there is merit for critical studies of legal consciousness in keeping these two things separate, and that this represents a dimension of the critical approach to rights consciousness that is largely missing from the field. We present a study of rights consciousness in relation to the imposition of lockdown in the United Kingdom during the early stage of the COVID‐19 pandemic. We show that, despite regarding lockdown as a violation of basic rights, most people did not feel a sense of grievance. Furthermore, rights consciousness was influenced by a range of factors distinct from political orientation, most of which were within the sphere of governmental influence. In this way, governmental power was constitutive of the public's rights consciousness. Further exploration and assessment of when, where, and how this might occur should be part of the critical project of legal consciousness research.

Source: Journal of Law and Society

DOI: 10.1111/jols.12498

Authors: SIMON HALLIDAY, ANDREW JONES, JED MEERS, JOE TOMLINSON

Institutions: University of Strathclyde, University of York

Language: English

Topic: Judicial and Constitutional Studies

Subfield: Law

Field: Social Sciences

Domain: Social Sciences

SDG: Peace, justice, and strong institutions

Open Access status: hybrid

Estimated APC paid: $3,020