A Theoretical Understanding of Abusive Intimate Partner Relationships that Become Non-violent: Shifting the Pattern of Abusive Control

Our theoretical understanding of abusive intimate partner relationships has ignored relationships that have become non-violent. We interviewed a community convenience sample of 27 women whose relationships had become non-violent. Using the constant comparative analysis of grounded theory, we generated a substantive theory, shifting the pattern of abusive control with three sub-processes, counteracting abuse, taking control, and living differently. Women’s acquisition of personal capacity and autonomy was foundational to countering the insidious oppression of abuse. Partners in these relationships that became non-violent, paid attention, gradually backing off and ceasing violent acts. For some women, coexisting in a violence-free relationship was satisfactory; for others, investing in an improved intimate partner relationship was essential for sustaining living differently. This theory provides direction for women who are working toward living differently with partners who are no longer violent, and for their helpers. Further, our findings contribute to our theoretical understanding of how abusive couple relationships may evolve over time.     

Soulless Wills

By analyzing wills submitted for execution to Israeli tribunals in the years 2000–2004, this article offers insights into the process of the legalization of death and family relations. The length, aesthetics, phrasing, and contents of the wills examined are all evidence of a process in which the personal wishes of testators are transformed into a standardized legal document that tells very little about the individual testator. The rarity of cases in which testators do use their wills to disclose personal sentiments and thoughts highlights the neglected potential of wills to constitute a unique, personal, and emotional parting statement. The article demonstrates that this potential embodies the different ways in which wills were perceived in ancient times. Inspired by these past and present examples and on the basis of a bifocal relational perception of inheritance, I argue that lawyers should adopt a broader human understanding of wills and offer their clients the option of leaving behind a will with a soul.     

Seasonal Affective Disorder: Clerk Training and the Success of Supreme Court Certiorari Petitions

We investigate why the Supreme Court grants a smaller percentage of cases at the first conference of each term compared to other conferences. According to received wisdom, Supreme Court law clerks are overly cautious at the beginning of their tenure because they receive only a brief amount of training. Reputational concerns motivate clerks to provide fewer recommendations to grant review in cert. pool memos written over the summer months. Using a random sample of petitions from the Blackmun Archives, we code case characteristics, clerk recommendation, and the Court's decision on cert. Nearest neighbor matching suggests clerks are 36 percent less likely to recommend grants in their early cert. pool memos. Because of this temporal discrepancy, petitions arriving over the summer have a 16 percent worse chance of being granted by the Court. This seasonal variation in access to the Court's docket imposes a legally irrelevant burden on litigants who have little control over the timing of their appeal.