Doctoral Dissertation Research: Legal Practice and the Production of Licit Subjects in Thailand

芝加哥大学博士生马拉维卡·雷迪将在约翰·d·凯利博士的指导下，调查那些在一个国家几乎没有法律地位的人，仍然能够在该国法院就劳动法提出索赔的情况。本研究将探讨这类案例的核心矛盾，即它们根据劳动法裁决索赔人的权利，而不裁决索赔人存在的合法性。雷迪假设，法律程序伪造了一种同时非法但又合法的地位，她提出了“合法归属”一词。该研究将在泰国进行，研究人员将重点关注缅甸移民工人提出的法律要求。雷迪将使用多种民族志方法，包括参与者观察、访谈和焦点小组，以及话语分析来观察外国工人是否以及如何在泰国法律体系内形成合法身份。详细的现场笔记和成绩单将通过专注于特定时刻的话语，当演员辩论什么是权威的法律实践分析。这将有可能把看似法律运作内部的讨论与泰国民族国家内部出现的合法形式的更广泛现象联系起来。通过调查外国工人如何能够为自己的利益动员法律，该研究将分析法律制度如何影响和受到已经成为全球资本主义标志的人员和资本的跨境流动的影响。因此，这项研究将为全球化和经济学的社会科学理论以及为改进公共政策提供知识作出重大贡献。资助这项研究也支持了社会科学家的教育。

University of Chicago doctoral student, Malavika Reddy, with the guidance of Dr. John D. Kelly, will investigate situations where people who otherwise have little to no legal standing in a country, are nevertheless able to make claims on labor laws in that country's courts. The research will examine the central contradiction of such cases under study, which is that they adjudicate claimants' rights under labor law without adjudicating the legality of claimants' presence. Reddy hypothesizes that the legal process forges a simultaneously illegal yet legitimate standing, for which she proposes the term, "licit belonging." The research will be conducted in Thailand where the researcher will focus on the legal claims made by Burmese migrant workers. Reddy will use a variety of ethnographic methods, including participant observation, interviews, and focus groups, as well as discourse analysis to observe whether, and how, a licit identity for alien workers is formed within the Thai legal system. Detailed field notes and transcripts will be analyzed by focusing on particular moments of discourse when actors debate what comprises authoritative legal practice. This will make it possible to connect discussions that are seemingly internal to the workings of the law with the broader phenomena of an emergent form of licit belonging within the Thai nation-state. By investigating how foreign workers are able to mobilize the law on their own behalf, the study will analyze how legal systems influence and are influenced by the cross-border movements of people and capital that have come to be the hallmarks of global capitalism. The research will thus contribute significantly to both social science theory of globalization and economics, and to knowledge that can inform an improved public policy. Funding this research also supports the education of a social scientist.