Citation

Heydebrand W, Seron C. Ind. Crisis Q. 1990; 4(2): 77-98.

Copyright

(Copyright © 1990, Industrial Crisis Institute - Bucknell University)

DOI

10.1177/108602669000400201

PMID

unavailable

Abstract

Since 1960, US district courts have faced a mounting volume and complexity in their caseload and, simultaneously, a relative decline in the fiscal and orga nizational resources available to meet the rising demand. Courts are attempt ing to manage this double threat to their identity by adopting a combination of computerization and a strategy of informalism, much like other organizations in the public and private sector. But courts are unique among public sector organizations in that formal-legal rules play a constitutive role in their orga nization and procedures. Insofar as informal and technocratic strategies of cri sis management become functionally autonomous, they tend to undermine the normative premises of courts and generate a second-order problem, viz, a crisis of crisis management.