The starting point for a public health law research study is the careful and credible measurement of law itself. The resources in this section discuss how to conduct legal research and the coding of statutes, regulations and cases in a transparent and reproducible manner.
In this editorial in JAMA Health Forum, Scott Burris, Rosalie Liccardo Pacula, and Alexander Wagenaar present a narrow definition of policy that focuses on its core function and in support of accurate evaluation of those policies and their implementation. The authors define policy as: a governmental or organizational instrument for promoting the general adoption of a desirable behavior or standard.
The sentinel surveillance of emerging laws and policies (SSELP) project has been developed by the Center for Public Health Law Research (CPHLR) with support from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation as a new legal mapping method intended to quickly capture and track emerging laws and legal innovations impacting public health.
Lindsay Cloud, JD, Director of the Policy Surveillance Program joined the Region V Public Health Training Center for its podcast in early 2020. Listen to learn about available tools and resources to support public health professionals and agencies in policy and advocacy work.
This monograph explores the special considerations in coding text when the relevant legal materials are judicial decisions. The content of case law merits careful study not simply because judicial opinions reflect or respond to the law, but because they are the law. But, more than this, judicial opinions are detailed repositories that show what kinds of disputes come before courts, how the parties frame their disputes, and how judges reason to their conclusions.
In "Measuring Statutory Law and Regulations for Empirical Research," Evan Anderson, Sue Thomas, Ryan Treffers, and Alexander C. Wagenaar provide researchers with a practical how-to guide in applying the scientific method to measure the law for quantitative research.
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