Editors' Note

Issue 2 of the Indiana Journal of Global Legal Studies includes a symposium on global rights consciousness that explores how understandings of globalization affect norms, practices, and beliefs about law's efficacy in social fields of various scales. It features an Article by Professor David Engel, whose analysis of rights consciousness is based on his longstanding experience as a sociolegal scholar in northern Thailand. His Article identifies multiple perspectives on law and society held by legal actors in a variety of official and unofficial situations. He distinguishes between what he calls vertical and horizontal perspectives as he relates the case of Thailand to broader questions of global rights consciousness and "law and society" scholarship. The Article is followed by four comments, each of which takes up aspects of Professor Engel's thesis and methodology. The Comments are authored by Professors Carol Greenhouse, Michael McCann, Duncan McCargo, and Arzoo Osanloo.

Additionally, we are honored to publish Professor Belinda Bennett's lecture, delivered on November 10, 2011, at the Indiana University Maurer School of Law during Professor Bennett's tenure as the George P. Smith II scholar in residence at the Law School. She analyzes the challenges law-makers and regulators face in the context of technological and scientific advances around the world.

The Indiana Journal of Global Legal Studies is grateful to all the authors whose work is published in Issue 2 for their scholarly contributions and their on-going commitment to the study of globalization and its relevance to law throughout the world.