Case Sensitive: Lawyers and the Formation of Legal Arguments in Tanzania

Abstract

This article uses evidence from Tanzanian lawyers and legal experts to advance a novel lawyer-centered explanation for Tanzania’s low levels of rights litigation. Like in many countries, Tanzanian citizens who pursue litigation depend on the presence, ideas, and guidance of lawyers. To understand patterns of litigation in Tanzania, therefore, we need to understand how lawyers make choices about their cases. Such knowledge is crucial to understanding litigation in Tanzania and in many other countries where lawyers bear similar responsibility in determining patterns of litigation. Here, I argue that three factors—legal education, laws and institutions, and judicial receptivity—dissuade lawyers from making rights-based arguments in cases where they might be appropriate. Lawyers’ avoidance of rights-based arguments in turn leads to low levels of rights litigation in Tanzania.