Austin Sarat

Author of When the State Kills: Capital Punishment and the American Condition

119 Works 598 Members 1 Review

About the Author

Austin Sarat is William Nelson Cromwell Professor of Jurisprudence & Political Science, Amherst College. Thomas R. Kearns is William H. Hastie Professor of Philosophy & Professor of Law, Jurisprudence, & Social Thought, Amherst College. (Bowker Author Biography)

Image credit: Amherst College (faculty page)

Series

Fundamental Issues in Law and Society Research

The Charles Hamilton Houston Institute Series on Race and Justice

Works by Austin Sarat

Narrative, Violence, and the Law: The Essays of Robert Cover (1993) — Editor — 38 copies

Gruesome Spectacles: Botched Executions and America's Death Penalty (2014) 34 copies

From Lynch Mobs to the Killing State: Race and the Death Penalty in America (2006) — Editor — 19 copies

Cause Lawyering: Political Commitments and Professional Responsibilities (Oxford Socio-Legal Studies) (1998) 15 copies

Mercy on Trial: What It Means to Stop an Execution (2005) 15 copies

The Killing State: Capital Punishment in Law, Politics, and Culture (1999) 15 copies

Law in Everyday Life (The Amherst Series in Law, Jurisprudence, and Social Thought) (1993) 12 copies

Race, law, and culture : reflections on Brown v. Board of Education (1997) 11 copies

Studies in Law, Politics and Society (Studies in Law, Politics, and Society) (Studies in Law, Politics, and Society) (2010) 11 copies

Life Without Parole: America's New Death Penalty? (2012) — Editor — 11 copies

The Blackwell Companion to Law and Society (2004) 9 copies

The Social Organization of Law: Introductory Readings (2004) 9 copies

Law in the Domains of Culture (The Amherst Series in Law, Jurisprudence, and Social Thought) (1998) 9 copies

Liberal Modernism and Democratic Individuality (1996) 9 copies

When Law Fails: Making Sense of Miscarriages of Justice (2009) — Editor — 9 copies

The Rhetoric of Law (The Amherst Series in Law, Jurisprudence, and Social Thought) (1994) 8 copies

Law in the Liberal Arts (2004) 7 copies

Law on the Screen (The Amherst Series in Law, Jurisprudence, and Social Thought) (2005) 7 copies

Law's Mistakes (The Amherst Series in Law, Jurisprudence, and Social Thought) (2016) 7 copies

Looking Back at Law's Century (2002) 7 copies

The Fate of Law (The Amherst Series in Law, Jurisprudence, and Social Thought) (1991) 7 copies

Cause Lawyers and Social Movements (Stanford Law Books) (2006) 6 copies

Law and the Stranger (The Amherst Series in Law, Jurisprudence, and Social Thought) (2010) 6 copies

Cultural Analysis, Cultural Studies, and the Law: Moving Beyond Legal Realism (2003) 6 copies

States of Violence: War, Capital Punishment, and Letting Die (2009) 6 copies

The Worlds Cause Lawyers Make: Structure and Agency in Legal Practice (2005) 6 copies

Punishment in Popular Culture (The Charles Hamilton Houston Institute Series on Race and Justice) (2015) — Editor — 6 copies

Law and the Humanities: An Introduction (2009) 6 copies

Merciful Judgments and Contemporary Society: Legal Problems, Legal Possibilities (2011) 6 copies

Pain, death, and the law (2001) 5 copies

Rhetorical Processes and Legal Judgments: How Language and Arguments Shape Struggles for Rights and Power (2016) 5 copies

Is the Death Penalty Dying?: European and American Perspectives (2011) 5 copies

A World without Privacy: What Law Can and Should Do? (2014) 5 copies

Cause Lawyering and the State in a Global Era (Oxford Socio-Legal Studies) (2001) 5 copies

Who Deserves to Die?: Constructing the Executable Subject (2011) 5 copies

Imagining new legalities : privacy and its possibilities in the 21st century (2012) 5 copies

History, Memory, and the Law (The Amherst Series in Law, Jurisprudence, and Social Thought) (1999) 5 copies

Divorce Lawyers and Their Clients: Power and Meaning in the Legal Process (1995) 5 copies

Dissent in Dangerous Times (2004) 5 copies

Legal Rights: Historical and Philosophical Perspectives (The Amherst Series in Law, Jurisprudence, and Social Thought) (1997) 4 copies

The Place of Law (The Amherst Series in Law, Jurisprudence, and Social Thought) (2003) 4 copies

Identities, Politics, and Rights (The Amherst Series in Law, Jurisprudence, and Social Thought) (1995) 4 copies

Law, Violence, and the Possibility of Justice. (2001) 4 copies

Cultural Pluralism, Identity Politics, and the Law (The Amherst Series in Law, Jurisprudence, and Social Thought) (1999) 4 copies

Human Rights: Concepts, Contests, Contingencies (The Amherst Series in Law, Jurisprudence, and Social Thought) (2002) 4 copies

Law's Madness (The Amherst Series in Law, Jurisprudence, and Social Thought) (2003) 4 copies

Imagining Legality: Where Law Meets Popular Culture (2011) 4 copies

Teaching Law and Literature (Modern Language Association of America Options for Teaching) (2011) 4 copies

Law as punishment/law as regulation (2011) 4 copies

Subjects of Responsibility: Framing Personhood in Modern Bureaucracies (2011) 4 copies

Legal Responses to Religious Practices in the United States: Accomodation and its Limits (2012) 4 copies

The Cultural Lives of Cause Lawyers (2008) 4 copies

Racial reconciliation and the healing of a nation : beyond law and rights (2017) — Editor — 4 copies

Special Issue: Social Movements/Legal Possibilities (Studies in Law, Politics, and Society) (2011) 4 copies

Law without nations (2010) 4 copies

Civil rights in American law, history, and politics (2014) 4 copies

Catastrophe : law, politics, and the humanitarian impulse (2009) 4 copies

The Road to Abolition?: The Future of Capital Punishment in the United States (Charles Hamilton Houston Institute… (2009) — Editor — 4 copies

Special Issue: Human Rights: New Possibilities/New Problems (Studies in Law, Politics, and Society) (2011) 4 copies

Lethal Injection and the False Promise of Humane Execution (2022) 3 copies

Feminist legal theory (2016) 3 copies

The Punitive Imagination: Law, Justice, and Responsibility (2014) 3 copies

Lives in the law (2002) 3 copies

Special Issue: The Beautiful Prison (Studies in Law, Politics, and Society) (2014) 3 copies

Human Rights and Legal Judgments: The American Story (2017) 3 copies

The handbook of law and society (2015) 3 copies

Everyday Practices and Trouble Cases (1998) 3 copies

Law and the Sacred (The Amherst Series in Law, Jurisprudence, and Social Thought) (2006) 3 copies

Special Issue: The Legacy of Stuart Scheingold (Studies in Law, Politics, and Society) (2012) 3 copies

Dissenting Voices in American Society: The Role of Judges, Lawyers, and Citizens (2012) 3 copies

Justice and injustice in law and legal theory (1996) 3 copies

Sovereignty, Emergency, Legality (2010) 3 copies

The Secrets of Law (The Amherst Series in Law, Jurisprudence, and Social Thought) (2012) 2 copies

Guns in Law (Amherst Series In Law Jurisprudence Social) (2019) 2 copies

Who belongs? immigration, citizenship, and the constitution of legality (2013) 2 copies

Studies in Law, Politics and Society, Volume 42 (Studies in Law, Politics & Society) (2006) 2 copies

Law and War (The Amherst Series in Law, Jurisprudence, and Social Thought) (2014) 2 copies

Special issue : problematizing prostitution : critical research and scholarship (2016) 2 copies

Special Issue : Cultural Expert Witnessing (2018) 2 copies

Special Issue Constitutional Polilitics in a Conservative Era (Studies in Law, Politics, and Society) (2008) 2 copies

Law and the liberal state (2014) 2 copies

Four Trials that Changed the World (2021) 2 copies

When governments break the law : the rule of law and the prosecution of the Bush administration 2 copies

Final judgments : the death penalty in American law and culture (2017) 2 copies

Special Issue: Vol. 52: Law Firms, Legal Culture, and Legal Practice (Studies in Law, Politics & Society) (2010) 2 copies

Knowing the suffering of others : legal perspectives on pain and its meanings (2014) 2 copies

Law and lies : deception and truth-telling in the American legal system (2015) 2 copies

Crossing Boundaries: Traditions and Transformations in Law and Society Research (1998) 2 copies

Studies in Law, Politics and Society, Volume 43: SPECIAL ISSUE: LAW AND LITERATURE RECONSIDERED (Studies in Law,… (2008) 2 copies

Forgiveness, Mercy, and Clemency (2006) 2 copies

Civility, Legality, and Justice in America (2014) 2 copies

Special Issue: The Discourse of Judging (Studies in Law, Politics, and Society) (2012) 2 copies

Reimagining To Kill a Mockingbird : family, community, and the possibility of equal justice under law (2013) 2 copies

Identities, Politics and Rights (Amherst Series in Law, Jurisprudence & Social Thought) (1997) 2 copies

Law and the utopian imagination (2014) 2 copies

The death penalty : influences and outcomes (2005) 1 copy

Special Issue: Law and the Imagining of Difference (Studies in Law, Politics, and Society) (Studies in Law Politics and… (2018) 1 copy

Law and Illiberalism (The Amherst Series in Law, Jurisprudence, and Social Thought) (2022) 1 copy

Law and the visible (2021) 1 copy

Trauma and Memory: Reading, Healing, and Making Law (Cultural Sitings) (2008) 1 copy

Interrupting the Legal Person (Studies in Law, Politics, and Society, 87) (2022) 1 copy

Law and Mourning (The Amherst Series in Law, Jurisprudence, and Social Thought) (2017) 1 copy

Capital punishment (2005) 1 copy

Performances of violence (2011) 1 copy

Trial Films on Trial: Law, Justice, and Popular Culture (2019) 1 copy

The Death Penalty on the Ballot: American Democracy and the Fate of Capital Punishment (2019) 1 copy

Intergenerational Justice (2014) 1 copy

Studies in law, politics, and society the death penalty dying? / Volume 42, Special issue 1 copy

Law and Catastrophe (The Amherst Series in Law, Jurisprudence, and Social Thought) (2007) 1 copy

The Cultural Lives of Capital Punishment: Comparative Perspectives (The Cultural Lives of Law) (2005) 1 copy

Revisiting Rights: Special Issue (Studies in Law, Politics and Society) (2009) 1 copy

Transitions : legal change, legal meanings (2012) 1 copy

Law and Society: The Next Generation (Studies in Law, Politics & Society) (Studies in Law, Politics, and Society) (2010) 1 copy

Human Rights: Concepts, Contests, Contingencies (The Amherst Series in Law, Jurisprudence, and Social Thought) (2001) 1 copy

Crime and Punishment:perspertives from the humanities (2005) 1 copy

The limits of law (2005) 1 copy

Road to Abolition? 1 copy

New Perspectives on American Law: An Introduction to Private Law in Politics and Society (1997) 1 copy

Work Explorer

Tagged

07-*NON-FICTION (2) 20th century (3) American (4) Box W (11) crime (4) criminal justice (3) death penalty (15) democracy (2) donate used book (3) execution (5) faculty authors (5) haifa7 (2) history (5) Jurisprudence (7) justice (2) kateb (2) language (3) law (61) law and literature (3) legal philosophy (4) legal theory (6) LX (2) new_Dec_2016 (2) non-fiction (10) office (3) PDF (2) philosophy (4) political science (2) political theory (6) politics (4) politics-and-bullshit (2) punishment (3) race (2) social justice (2) sociology (2) to-read (18) UBLaw (5) USA (4) violence (6) where to donate books (2)

Common Knowledge

Gender: male
Education: Providence College (BA)
University of Wisconsin (MA, PhD)
Yale University (JD)
Occupations: Professor
Organizations: Amherst College (Professor of Jurisprudence and Political Science)

Members

Reviews

Gruesome Spectacles: Botched Executions and… by Austin Sarat

What I thought would be a quick read of botched executions turned out to be a serious study of capital punishment from the perspective of botched executions. The author traces the history of capital punishment from the days when it demonstrated that one's life belonged to the king, who could take it away in the most gruesome manner imaginable or just as easily grant a pardon, to the present day when executions have become bureaucratic excercises performed away from the public's view. The author also shows how botched executions and the drive to find an efficient and painless way to kill have driven the move from hanging to electrocution to gassing to the present day lethal infection. In the author's statistics of all botched executions since 1900, lethal infection actually has a higher rate of executions gone wrong (7.12% compared to 3.12% for hanging and 1.92% for the electric chair).… (more)

Flagged

jimcintosh | May 11, 2016 |

See More Reviews