Diverse societies are now connected by globalization, but how do ordinary people feel about law as they cope day-to-day with a transformed world? Tort, Custom, and Karma examines how rapid societal changes, economic development, and integration into global markets have affected ordinary people's perceptions of law, with a special focus on the narratives of men and women who have suffered serious injuries in the province of Chiangmai, Thailand. This work embraces neither the conventional view that increasing global connections spread the spirit of liberal legalism, nor its antithesis that backlash to interconnection leads to ideologies such as religious fundamentalism. Instead, it looks specifically at how a person's changing ideas of community, legal justice, and religious belief in turn transform the role of law particularly as a viable form of redress for injury. This revealing look at fundamental shifts in the interconnections between globalization, state law, and customary practices uncovers a pattern of increasing remoteness from law that deserves immediate attention.
"David Engel and Jaruwan Engel make an important contribution to the field of sociolegal studies in this outstanding, concise volume that traces the retreat of law in the face of rapid social change in Chiang Mai . . . The book's insights into the relationship between community-based and state-based resolution of disputes are particularly valuable . . . Essential."
J. D. Marshall, Choice
"This beautifully clear book reveals how globalization has torn the webs of locally based legal and religious dispute resolution systems without putting anything in their place. The result, for many accident victims, is a reemphasis on religious ways of making sense of and responding to accidents, rather than a focus on the law and compensation."
David Nelken, Cardiff University, UK and Macerata University, Italy
"This is a brilliant and artful account of the dwindling of law in contemporary Thai life. It presents a formidable challenge to the widespread expectation that globalization will be accompanied by enlarged reliance on increasingly similar law."
Marc Galanter, London School of Economics and Political Science
