Introduction: The Impact of Political Change upon Law, Courts, and Judicial Elites

Abstract

The impact of significant political change and conflict upon law, and legal and judicial elites is central theme of this issue of International Political Science Review. For decades, little attention was paid to attributes and political and social roles of lawyers and judges froma comparative cross-national perspective. Eighteenth, nineteenthand early twentieth-century assessments of determinants of characteristics of legal systems generally emphasized factors other than legal and judicial elite characteristics and roles. Thus Montesquieu identified climate and geographical location [1748] (1977) as did Randall (1918). Sir Henry Maine emphasized early legal codification [1861] (1931). James Bryce focused upon racial characteristics (1902 and 1918), while Achille Loria underscored economic factors as decisive (1918). In contrast, after assessing sixteen legal systems (ancient as well as contemporary) which he deemed most significant, John Henry Wigmore found ample empirical evidence to eliminate race as a determinant. Instead, he suggested that the rise and perpetuation of a legal system is dependent on development and survival of a highly trained professional class (1928: 1127). Early in nineteenth century, Alexis de Tocqueville had introduced several basic assumptions about collective attitudes and societal roles of lawyers and judges. In his partially completed work on The Ancient Regime, he pointed out that German lawyers had recommended that Roman law should replace or modify German law in order to serve interests of monarchy. He further noted that because it degraded political society,

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