Abstract
There is a growing literature within sociolegal research regarding the constitutive nature of law.' This literature primarily has been concerned with demonstrating that legal institutions constitute aspects of social life, including, at times, aspects of human social identity. The constitutive influence of law becomes most obvious when the legal system under scrutiny exhibits an overtly differentiated form of citizenship, such as in ancient Athens, feudal Europe, or even the pre-Civil War United States. In these societies, law served to embed multiple privileged and subordinate social and political statuses, differentiated according to characteristics such as lineage, caste, and race. As a result, one's
status as citizen, serf, or slave served not only as a social but also as a legal position, grounded not merely in social relations but also entrenched in, and reinforced by, the law itself.