Doctoral Dissertation Research in Law and Social Science

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Courts depend on litigants -- individuals, government agencies, businesses and increasingly, interest groups -- to bring policy issues to their attention. To understand the agendas of courts, it is crucial to determine how litigants decide to bring claims to court. This dissertation grant provides support to Cary Coglianese to examine how one important set of litigants, interest groups, decides which claims to file in court. While scholars have developed models explaining how individuals select claims to bring to court, the process of dispute selection in organizations is much less understood. Mr. Coglianese's dissertation research fills in this gap in sociolegal understanding by developing and testing a model of organizational dispute selection. Investigating interest groups active in environmental policy, the study draws on interviews with the staff and legal counsel of 25 interest groups, as well as on an analysis of court briefs and other primary sources. In addition to advancing understanding of organizational dispute selection, the study's focus on dispute selection facilitates examination of how legal rules influence the decision-making of interest groups. Specifically, variations in environmental statutes on such matters as standing, proof, and attorney's fees are examined to see how they influence interest groups' decisions about which cases to bring to court. Therefore, the project also contributes to basic understanding about the sociolegal dynamics influencing interest group behavior.