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signals its move to a new stage when the
Banakar, R. (2000) ‘Reflections on the
socio-legal field has to reconsider its rela- Methodological Issues of the Sociology of
tionship with both law and sociology. Law’, Journal of Law and Society, 27:
273–95.
Banakar, R. (2003) Merging Law and Sociology:
Beyond the Dichotomies of Socio-Legal
NOTES Research. Berlin/Wisconsin: Galda and Wilch.
Banakar, R. (2004) ‘When do Rights Matter?’,
1 In the following pages, I shall distinguish in S. Halliday and P. Schmidt (eds.) Human
between ‘socio-legal research’ and ‘Socio-Legal Rights Brought Home. Oxford: Hart
Studies’. The former refers to all social scientific stud- Publishing. pp. 165–84.
ies of law, while the latter refers to the Socio-Legal Banakar, R. and Travers, M. (2005) ‘Law,
Studies movement in UK. Sociology and Method’, in R. Banakar and
2 For lack of space I limit my discussion of M. Travers (eds.) Theory and Method in
jurisprudence and legal positivism to the English ana- Socio-Legal Research. Oxford: Hart
lytical tradition of Austin and Hart. Publishing. pp. 1–25.
3 This understanding of law is questioned by crit-
ical legal scholars and various schools of feminism as Baumgartner, M. P. (2000) ‘The Sociology of
a smoke screen for concealing the class, racialized Law’, in Dennis Patterson (ed.) A Companion
and gendered nature of the law and legal reasoning. to Philosophy of Law. Oxford: Blackwell.
Even assuming that the judge can and does apply the pp. 406–20.
law objectively, he or she applies a law which is tilted Black, D. (1976) The Behavior of Law.
in favour of a specific group’s interests and values. New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press.
4 The notion of ‘gaze’ is borrowed from Foucault Bourdieu, P. (1975) ‘The Specificity of the
(1997) and refers to an impersonal way of observing Scientific Field and the Social Conditions of
which does not belong to any individual person, and the Progress of Reason’, Social Science
can operate as a general principle of surveillance Information, 14: 19–47.
(even monitoring one’s own activities), while unifying
diverse practices. Bourdieu, P. (2004) Science of Science and
5 Let me reiterate that I distinguish between Reflexivity. Cambridge: Polity Press.
‘Socio-Legal’, which refers to the British movement Bradney, A. (1998) ‘Law as a Parasitic Discipline’,
within law schools which is influenced by social Journal of Law and Society, 25: 71–84.
theory and ‘socio-legal’ which refers to all social sci- Campbell, C. M. and Wiles, P. (1976) ‘The
entific studies of law including sociology of law. Study of Law and Society in Britain’, Law and
6 Distinguishing between the legal system’s inter- Society Review, 10: 547-78.
nal and external points of view, or ‘inside’ and ‘out- Cotterrell, R. (1992) The Sociology of Law: An
side’ of law, is problematic and misleading. For a Introduction. London: Butterworths.
discussion see Banakar (2003). Cotterrell, R. (2003) The Politics of
7 Papers published in such journals as Journal of
Law and Society, Modern Law Review and Social & Jurisprudence: A Critical Introduction to
Legal Studies provide fairly reliable indicators of the Philosophy of Law. London: LexisNexis UK.
type of work produced by the socio-legal community Cotterrell, R. (2005) ‘Durkheim’s Loyal Jurist:
in Britain. The Sociological Theory of Paul Huvelin’,
8 This can also mean that the rise of legal feminist Ratio Juris, 18(4): 504–18.
scholarship and postmodern legal research has Cotterrell, R. (2006) Law, Culture and
brought Socio-Legal Studies (SLS) closer to Critical Sociology. Aldershot: Ashgate.
Legal Studies (CLS). While the SLS has gone from Coyle, S. and Pavlakos, G. (eds.) (2005)
strength to strength, the CLS has somewhat shrunk Jurisprudence and Legal Science. Oxford:
in size and lost its ideological momentum.
Hart Publishing.
Durkheim, E. (1984) The Division of Labour in
Society. London: Macmillan.
Dworkin, R. (1986) Law’s Empire. London:
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