William E. Pomeranz
In Everyday Law in Russia, Kathryn Hendley provides a comprehensive analysis of how local justice works in Russia. What emerges is a compelling story of Russian citizens as rational actors who fully understand the pluses and minuses of using the courts and who ultimately make their own personal and financial calculations when confronted with a civil wrong.
Marina Kurkchiyan
Everyday Law in Russia is one of a very few attempts that have been made to study what law means and how it works for ordinary Russians. It is also by some margin the most comprehensive to date. Kathryn Hendley breaks away from the view that the law does not matter very much in Russia, that the legal system is dysfunctional, and that courts, judges, and lawyers exist principally to serve the political and economic interests of the elite. Hendley is no starry-eyed idealist; she just reports what she sees. In this work she invites us to join her in observing the ordinary people of Russia, most of whose lives are never touched by politics.