The law cannot save those who deny it but neither can the law serve any who do not use it. The history of injustice and inequality is a history of disuse of the law. Law has not failed--and is not failing. We as a nation have failed ourselves by not trusting the law and by not using the law to gain sooner the ends of justice which law alone serves. ~
Lyndon B. Johnson
Legal mobilisation is a tool available to paralegal and
advocacy groups, to achieve
legal empowerment by supporting a marginalized issues of a stakeholder, in negotiating with the other concerned agencies and other stakeholders, by strategic combined use of
legal processes along with
advocacy, media engagement and social mobilisation.[1] As per Frances Kahen Zemans (1983) the Legal mobilisation is "a desire or want, which is translated into a demand as an assertion of one's rights".[2]
According to Lisa Vanhala (November 2011) Legal mobilisation in its narrowest sense, may refer to high-profile litigation efforts for (or, arguably, against)
social change or more broadly, term legal mobilisation has been used to describe any type of process by which an individual or collective actors invoke legal norms, discourse, or symbols to influence policy or behavior.[3] This typically means that there are policies or regulations to mobilize around and a mechanism by which to do so.[4] Legislative activity does create an opportunity for legal mobilization. The courts become particularly relevant when petitioners have grounds to file suit.[4]
History of conceptualisation
The use of the law and legal systems by disadvantaged people to contest the unfair distribution of power and resources is a real-world phenomenon that predates and exists independently of international law and
justice assistance.[5]
study and research
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Tool to ensure statutory intervention
Particularly in circumstances where traditional power resources, in terms of bargaining power and worker solidarity, are not firmly established, Use of the legal mobilisation clearly offers important additional tactics.[6]
^Zemans, Frances (Sep 1983). "Legal Mobilization: The Neglected Role of the Law in the Political System". The American Political Science Review. 77 (3). USA: American Political Science Association: 690–703.
doi:
10.2307/1957268.
JSTOR1957268.
S2CID147561468.
^Colling, Trevor (June 2009). Marginson, Paul (ed.).
"Court in a trap? Legal Mobilisation by Trade Unions in the United Kingdom"(PDF). Warwick Papers in Industrial Relations. 91. Warwick, Coventry, United Kingdom: Industrial Relation s Research Unit University of Warwick Coventry. Retrieved 24 November 2014.