Judges seek approval from audiences they esteem, not only legal or policy ends

Evidence

Political scientist Lawrence Baum has proposed a third perspective that combines aspects of the legal and political perspectives.4+ Both those perspectives, he notes, portray judges as motivated solely by their interest in the substance of legal policy. Thus, according to the legal perspective, judges seek to determine what case outcomes best accord with the law. And according to the political perspective, judges seek to determine what outcomes best advance their policy objectives. But as Baum sees it, both these accounts rest on too narrow a view of human motivation and fail to recognize the breadth of factors that affect human behavior. More specifically, Baum notes that human beings act not only to achieve particular ends but also to win the approval of those whose esteem they value. This personal interest in popularity and respect is common to all people. Transferring this insight to the realm of courts, Baum focuses on how judges seek to win the approval of the audiences they value through their decisions, their communication of those decisions, and their interactions on the bench. — G. Alan Tarr, Judicial Process and Judicial…, 2624

Categorization

• DEFINE: Introduces Baum’s ‘audience’ perspective as a third model of judicial motivation alongside legal and political perspectives.
• XREF: Directly relevant to the course’s core question of what drives judicial decision-making alongside the attitude model from earlier chapters. — connects to: Dissents on multimember courts cannot be explained by legal factors alone — G. Alan Tarr, Judicial Process and Judicial…, 2561; Voter backlash can remove judges who sit on cases involving their benefactors — G. Alan Tarr, Judicial Process and Judicial…, 584; Broadcasters invoke public consensus to legitimize contested decisions. (+1 more)

Broader Connections

• Broadcasters invoke public consensus to legitimize contested decisions. #corroborates (0.75)