Moran on Social Science and Race Cases

Constructing Reality: Social Science and Race Cases, by Beverly I. Moran, Vanderbilt University School of Law, is an article originally published in the Northern Illinois University Law Review in 2005 and now posted on SSRN. The abstract follows:

Dred Scott v. Sanford, Plessy v. Ferguson, Brown v. Board of Education and Grutter v. Bollinger all demonstrate that law alone is not enough to make social change. Instead, lawyers interested in social change must understand the nature of the societies that they attempt to persuade and the language that leads judges to change their ways of thinking. In the early 21st century, the language of persuasion is often the language of social science.