When activists use the law to promote social change, how does the branch of law (criminal law, civil law, etc.) matter for movement outcomes? To examine this question, the article builds on legal mobilization scholarship, and on a qualitative study comparing three litigation strategies to contest racialized policing in France: mobilizing criminal law to hold officers accountable for police killings, mobilizing civil law to sue the state for racial profiling, and combining criminal and civil law to contest racialized police harassment. The findings suggest that three characteristics of legal branches matter for legal mobilization: (i) the branch's dominant paradigm (e.g., punitive vs. compensatory) determines how the problem gets framed and which actors are blamed for it; (ii) the legal provisions of each branch shape which aspects of the problem get highlighted, and which are obscured; (iii) the procedural and evidentiary rules determine the extent to which activists and victims can intervene in the fact-finding process and thus how much they can influence the strength of their claims in court. When they mobilize the law, social change actors strategize around the opportunities and constraints of various branches of law, to try influencing judicial decisions and the media coverage of cases.

中文翻译：

---

法律动员和法律分支：反对法国法院的种族化警务

当活动家使用法律来促进社会变革时，法律分支（刑法、民法等）对运动结果有何影响？为了研究这个问题，本文以法律动员奖学金和一项定性研究为基础，比较了三种诉讼策略来对抗法国的种族化警务：动员刑法追究警察杀人的责任，动员民法起诉国家进行种族定性，并结合刑法和民法来对抗种族化的警察骚扰。调查结果表明，法律部门的三个特征对法律动员很重要：(i) 部门的主导范式（例如，惩罚性与补偿性）决定了问题是如何形成的，以及哪些行为者应该为此受到指责；(ii) 每个分支的法律规定决定了问题的哪些方面突出，哪些方面模糊；(iii) 程序和证据规则决定了活动家和受害者可以在多大程度上干预事实调查过程，从而决定他们可以在多大程度上影响他们在法庭上的主张的力度。当他们动员法律时，社会变革行动者会围绕各种法律部门的机会和制约因素制定战略，试图影响司法决策和媒体对案件的报道。