Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin - Integrative Research Institute Law & Society (LSI)

The impact of the German Constitutional Court

 

Paul David Scherer


This socio-legal research project aims to analyze the German Federal Constitutional Court’s decisions on Lebenspartnerschaft (civil partnership for same-sex couples) to explore the interdependence between law, jurisprudence and social transformation.
What is the role of the Court within the transformation of social realities? Does it accelerate social change or does it only legitimize already existing social postulates, or both? In what way is the Court configured in the legal discourse and how does it (re)act in each specific actor field? What is the influence of transnational interactions between courts of different levels?
To answer these research questions, qualitative social research methods, such as discourse analysis, will be used.