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Purpose: This article critically examines the interplay between individualism and collectivism in legal systems. It argues that the law remains disproportionately focused on individual rights and duties, even though group dynamics demonstrably shape behaviour. The paper therefore calls for the formal recognition of informal groups and the integration of collective responsibility to reflect current social realities more accurately.Methodology: Employing a historical-legal and interdisciplinary lens, the study traces the evolution of individualism from Roman law to modern legal frameworks. It combines comparative legal analysis, theoretical critique, and normative analysis to propose legal reforms that reconcile individual autonomy with collective accountability.Findings: Historically, legal systems have privileged individualism and underestimated the influence of groups. As a result, informal collectives often lack protection and meaningful participation in legal processes. This over-emphasis on the individual hampers effective responses to systemic discrimination, environmental harm, and labour rights violations. Although certain branches—such as corporate and environmental law—implicitly recognise collective responsibility, explicit mechanisms to balanceindividual and group interests are still required. Flexible legal models can integrate group accountability without eroding personal rights.Practical implications: Conferring limited legal personality on informal groups would enable them to assert rights without full formalisation. A calibrated balance between individual and collective liability would enhance the law’s capacity to address problems that demand shared responsibility. Strengthening collective legal tools—such as class actions, trade unions, and community governance—would improve legal representation, while the use of AI-enabled digital platforms could foster participatorylaw-making and deliver fairer legal structures. Namen: Članek kritično obravnava preplet individualizma in kolektivizma v pravnih sistemih. Avtor trdi, da je pravo nesorazmerno osredotočeno na individualne pravice in dolžnosti, čeprav skupinska dinamika dokazano oblikuje vedenje. Zato poziva k formalnemu priznanju neformalnih skupin in vključitvi kolektivne odgovornosti, s čimer bi pravo natančneje odražalo sodobno družbeno stvarnost.Metodologija: S historično-pravnim in interdisciplinarnim pristopom študija sledi razvoju individualizma od rimskega prava do sodobnih pravnih okvirov. Združuje primerjalnopravno analizo, teoretsko kritiko in normativno analizo ter predlaga reforme, ki usklajujejo individualno avtonomijo s kolektivno odgovornostjo.Ugotovitve: Zgodovinsko gledano so pravni sistemi privilegirali individualizem in podcenjevali vpliv skupin. Posledično neformalne skupine ne uživajo ustrezne zaščite in smiselne udeležbe v pravnih postopkih. To pretirano poudarjanje posameznika ovira učinkovite odzive na sistemsko diskriminacijo, okoljsko škodo in kršitve delavskih pravic. Čeprav nekatera področja – na primer korporacijsko in okoljsko pravo – implicitno priznavajokolektivno odgovornost, so za uravnoteženje interesov posameznika in skupnosti še vedno potrebni izrecni mehanizmi. Prilagodljivi pravni modeli lahko vključijo skupinsko odgovornost, ne da bi pri tem razvrednotiliosebne pravice.Praktične posledice: Podelitev omejene pravne subjektivitete neformalnim skupinam bi jim omogočila uveljavljanje pravic brez popolne formalizacije. Uravnoteženo razmerje med individualno in kolektivno odgovornostjo bi okrepilo sposobnost prava za reševanje problemov, ki zahtevajo deljeno odgovornost. Krepitev kolektivnih pravnih orodij – kot so skupinske tožbe, sindikati in skupnostno upravljanje – bi izboljšala pravno zastopanje, uporaba digitalnih platform z umetno inteligenco pa bi lahko spodbujala participativno oblikovanje prava in pravičnejše pravne strukture.

This paper advances novel theory and evidence on the emergence of informal leadership networks in groups that feature no formally designated leaders or authority hierarchies. We integrate insights from relational schema and network theory to develop and empirically test a three-step process model. The model’s first hypothesis is that people use a “linear ordering schema” to process information about leadership relations. The second hypothesis argues that when an individual experiences a particular leadership attribution to be inconsistent with the linear ordering schema, that individual will tend to reduce the ensuing cognitive inconsistency by modifying that leadership attribution. Finally, the third hypothesis builds on this inconsistency-reduction mechanism to derive implications about a set of network structural features (asymmetry, acyclicity, transitivity, popularity, and inverse popularity) that are predicted to emerge endogenously as a group’s informal leadership network evolves. We find broad support for our proposed theoretical model using a multi-method, multi-study approach combining experimental and observational data. Our study contributes to the organizational literature by illuminating a socio-cognitive dynamics underpinning the evolution of informal leadership structures in groups where formal authority plays a limited role. The e-companion is available at https://doi.org/10.1287/orsc.2017.1171 .

This paper addresses growing professional discontents with the increasing formalisation of social work practice exerted through systems of risk management and audit. Drawing on an ESRC-funded study of social work practices in children's statutory services, this paper provides a critique of instrumental approaches to risk management in social work. Through the discussion of three illustrative case examples, we argue that risk management is an inherently complex, contingent and negotiated activity. Social work practitioners are obliged to comply with risk reduction technologies, but informal processes continue to play a critical role in shaping decisions and actions in this relationship-based profession. From practitioner accounts, we identify key elements of the informal logics of risk management. We conclude that the bureaucratic–instrumental bias manifest in the modernisation of children's services, in privileging metrics and administrative power leaves the informal and relational aspects of practice under-emphasised and under-theorised. Suggestions are made about how practice might be advanced in the complex world of child welfare and protection.

High commodity prices have led to the proliferation of informal gold mining in the Andes. Despite their limited financial capacity, informal gold miners have proved capable of influencing national-level policy outcomes. Why are they able to do so? This study puts forward a comparative study of Bolivia, where informal miners have been politically incorporated, and Peru, where they have been traditionally excluded. It shows how, despite the very different institutional contexts, informal miners are similarly capable of leveraging their contribution to the local economy and the fracture between the central state and its peripheral branches to form pressure groups with local authorities. Based on 120 interviews with politicians and leaders from the largest gold-mining communities in Bolivia and Peru, this study contributes to the scholarship on state-society relations, resource politics, and decentralization by outlining the conditions and mechanism through which informal groups contest exclusionary resource governance in fragmented states.

This study examined home environment conditions (housing quality, material resources, formal and informal learning materials) and their relations with the Human Development Index (HDI) in 28 developing countries.Home environment conditions in these countries varied widely. The quality of housing and availability of material resources at home were consistently tied to HDI; the availability of formal and informal learning materials a little less so. Gross domestic product (GDP) tended to show a stronger independent relation with housing quality and material resources than life expectancy and education. Formal learning resources were independently related to the GDP and education indices, and informal learning resources were not independently related to any constituent indices of the overall HDI.

In this paper we examine whether individualization and informalization processes have occurred in the field of leisure in The Netherlands, by analyzing the social context of a wide range of activities between 1975 and 2005. We find that the choice of a particular leisure context is dependent on education, gender, year of birth, age and time pressure. We find evidence for informalization, but—contrary to popular belief—not for individualization. The informalization trend follows a pattern of cohort replacement, and is also caused by a rise in the average education level in the population. Our findings imply that research on civil society, community and social capital should not only be concerned with membership rates, but also with participation in alternative social contexts.

We use a novel research design to empirically detect the effect of social interactions on labor market outcomes. Using Census data on residential and employment locations, we examine whether individuals residing in the same city block are more likely to work together than those in nearby blocks. We find evidence of significant social interactions. The estimated referral effect is stronger when individuals are similar in sociodemographic characteristics. These findings are robust across specifications intended to address sorting and reverse causation. Further, the increased availability of neighborhood referrals has a significant impact on a wide range of labor market outcomes.

The emergence of the gig economy has generated a new class of workers who are categorised as independent “partners” instead of employees with rights to labour protection. Triggered by observations of a protest movement by platform-based delivery riders in Thailand, we engaged in seven months of digital ethnographic research of riders’ interactions online to understand the emergence of informal groups facilitating mutual aid and collective action. Civil society research has neglected to analyse such groups within the gig economy. The study finds that social media is a site for the development and contestation of identity narratives. We observed a “Hero” narrative that glorifies delivery riders' independent status and a “Worker” narrative that challenges riders' conditions. We argue that these collective identity narratives crucially facilitate or inhibit the emergence of labour-oriented civil society organisations, thus contributing to third sector research that examines civil society in the Global South.

The European Union has seen the rise of informal groups of states as an increasingly important governance mechanism within its formal structures. Such groups can make decision-making processes more efficient, but they also suffer from a substantial lack of legitimacy in the eyes of the non-members. In this article, we examine how informal groups overcome this fundamental dilemma between efficiency and legitimacy and sustain themselves at the forefront of important policy areas. To this end, we trace the development of what we argue to be a particularly useful case: the E3 directoire in the nuclear negotiations with Iran. The empirical results point to new insights into how directoires – and informal groups in general – can use different types of legitimation strategies to gain and maintain legitimacy. More specifically, the E3 implemented three successive legitimation strategies – detachment, co-optation and integration – using different types of legitimacy sources, in particular problem-solving, institutional adjustments and fostering institutional and policy congruence.

The archaeological site of Copan was a cultural and commercial crossroads at the southeastern Maya frontier. Research indicates that the demographics and sociopolitical circumstances of the city of Copan and its location within a circumscribed pocket (24 km2) of the larger Copan Valley varied through time. These circumstances not only influenced its social, political, and economic interactions, but likely the size, construction, and organization of households, specifically plazuelas. Copan's plazuelas differ from those located in other Maya regions because they often have smaller house platforms, comprise more than a single patio, and exhibit a larger than normal proportion of informal groups. Gini coefficients, to investigate wealth inequality based on household size using area, volume, and a modified volume, were calculated for Late Classic Copan to allow for comparisons to Gini coefficients from other Maya regions. While the Gini coefficients suggest that wealth inequality at Copan is much higher than in other Maya regions, deeper interpretations of inequality based solely on the Gini coefficients are limited, requiring not only additional geospatial analysis employing a multi-proxy Gini coefficient, but, importantly, a comparison to and a deeper reflection on previous research at Copan.