Reluctant conformity: Volunteers’ faith in, and expectations of, law when performing maritime search and rescue work

This article examines how Search and Rescue volunteers think of and narrate their experiences of the law in the course of their work and assess the legitimacy of the actions of coastal states when responding to refugees making sea crossings. This paper argues that a narrative schema of ‘reluctant conformity’ explains how Search and Rescue volunteers practically reconcile the faith they demonstrate in law with their operational reality, in light of multiple, competing obligations. The encapsulation of volunteers’ confidence in the law and legal education within this narrative of legal consciousness underscores the challenges that Search and Rescue workers in small, volunteer-led, organisations face when the faith and expectations they have in the law are dashed. The paper sits within wider literature on legal consciousness research to explain how people understand and sustain conceptions of ‘the law’ in the face of multiple competing legal orders operating in the same context, and ends with a reflection on the importance of legal education to address the expectations people may have of law within a ‘reluctant conformity’ legal consciousness.