This paper analyzes the relationship, in Colombia, between law and modernization until 1945, and, since then, between law and economic development. This last phase saw a transformation from an instrumental conception of law to an understanding of law as a state mechanism used to fulfil the goals of classical liberalism. It is from this perspective that the 1991 Constitution came to be seen as a source of institutions that block economic growth. This severely complicates the possibility of a dialogue between economists and lawyers, which cannot ignore the aims of development, nor can it ignore the conditions that a model of ideal liberal institutions imposes.

The concept of "family" plays an important role in the way national legal regimes distribute both power and resources. However, the idea of what a family is or should be is not univocal for all branches of law. In this paper we wish to contribute to feminist thinking about the law and to legal theory in general, by showing the contradictions and gaps in law's incorporation of the legal concept of the family and their distributive impact. We use the notion of conceptual fragmentation to refer to the irregular manner in which family as a legal concept lands into the realms of diverse fields of law at different moments in time and with different emphasis. We argue that conceptual fragmentation makes connections through time and subject matter invisible, and therefore makes it harder to have a critique of the role of the family, treated as a legal concept, in the oppression of women. We establish that conceptual fragmentation is not irrational or incoherent but rather patterned in ways that correspond to the losses of women in contemporary societies. We use the case of colombian law to illustrate the stakes involved in defining the family and the operations that we call fragmentation. In particular, we explain how family law exceptionalism was produced, the importance of the legal concept of the family within family law and its ambivalence as to the proper definition, and the evolution of the concept of family within social policy. We argue that even if the stakes of the family seem to be all for same sex couples, in so far as "family" is still about reproduction and distribution, we should be vigilant about how women fare in the conceptual turns that seek to bring us closer to the natural family. Abstract Resumen ResumoEl concepto de familia desempeña un rol fundamental en la forma en que los regímenes jurídicos distribuyen poder y recursos. No obstante, la definición de qué es una familia o que debería serlo, no es uniforme en las distintas ramas del derecho. En este artículo buscamos contribuir al pensamiento feminista con respecto al derecho y a la teoría jurídica en general, mostrando las contradicciones y lagunas que existen en la forma en la que el derecho incorpora el concepto jurídico de familia, así como también su impacto distributivo. Para este fin utilizamos el concepto de fragmentación conceptual, que permite abordar la forma irregular en la cual la familia, como concepto jurídico, es incorporada en distintas ramas del derecho, en distintos momentos y con distintos énfasis. Argumentamos que esta fragmentación conceptual hace que las conexiones a través del tiempo y materia sean invisibilizadas y, por ende, hace que sea más difícil criticar el rol de la familia como concepto jurídico que PALAVRAS-CHAVE:Direito de família | política social | feminismo | gênero | desigualdade | mulheres

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