page_title: Legal socialization
section_title: Authority and legitimacy
hierarchical_section_title: Legal socialization / Authority and legitimacy
caption_attribution_description: English: This is a high-resolution image of the United States Declaration of Independence (article - text). This image is a version of the 1823 William Stone facsimile — Stone may well have used a wet pressing process (that removed ink from the original document onto a contact sheet for the purpose of making the engraving). Español: Versión manuscrita de la Declaración de Independencia de los Estados Unidos. Reproducción del facsímil de William Stone (1823) en el que posiblemente se utilizó un proceso de prensado en húmedo que eliminó la tinta del documento original en una hoja de contacto con el propósito de hacer el grabado.
context_page_description: Legal socialization is the process through which, individuals acquire attitudes and beliefs about the law, legal authorities, and legal institutions. This occurs through individuals' interactions, both personal and vicarious, with police, courts, and other legal actors. To date, most of what is known about legal socialization comes from studies of individual differences among adults in their perceived legitimacy of law and legal institutions, and in their cynicism about the law and its underlying norms. Adults' attitudes about the legitimacy of law are directly tied to individuals' compliance with the law and cooperation with legal authorities.
  Legal socialization consists of an individual's attitudes toward the legal system, the law, and moral codes that guide behaviour
context_section_description: When experiences with legal actors are perceived as fair, just and proportionate, these experiences reinforce the legitimacy of the
  law, and can contribute to compliance and desistance. However, when punishment is delivered unfairly, unjustly and/or disproportionately, it leads to cynicism about the law, and can contribute to anger and persistence (Sampson and Bartusch, 1998; Kirk and Papachristos, 2011; Papachristos,Meares and Fagan, 2012). It is easier in a democratic and pluralist society to exercise authority through legitimacy, i.e. Acting in ways that people find appropriate, reasonable and just.
  According to Tom R. Tyler, People obey the law if they believe it's legitimate, not because they fear punishment—this is the startling conclusion of Tom Tyler's classic study. Tyler suggests that lawmakers and law enforcers would do much better to make legal systems worthy of respect than to try to instill fear of punishment. He finds that people obey law primarily because they believe in respecting legitimate authority. Brute coercive power may achieve obedience but will not sustain it. Only a sense of fairness, trust and legitimacy can do that by nurturing feelings of obligation. When outcomes are fair, and the procedures that lead to those outcomes transparent and just, people will follow rules, cooperate with police, pay fines, and accept punishment. Procedural justice - the experience directly or vicariously of transparency, fairness, neutrality and respect in dealings with criminal justice - is vital for any rule-following behaviour.
caption: It is not the enactment, but the observance of laws, that creates the character of a nation. ~ Calvin Coolidge
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