The Empirical Approach to Research in Property Law

Abstract

This article offers an account of the unique characteristics, challenges and benefits of empirical legal research. The authors explain that empirical legal research involves the collection and observation of data through a variety of research techniques, such as interviews, observation and surveys, and how it difers from some of its close neighbours, in particular socio-legal research. While the challenges posed by empirical legal research are acknowledged, this article argues that it enriches property law scholarship by enabling researchers to weave together the law learned in books with the law understood and applied in practice.

Socio-Legal Research: Integration of Normative and Empirical Juridical Research in Legal Research

“…In empirical legal studies, the law is not seen as a separate field of study but as a social institution capable of influencing and being influenced by other social phenomena. 27 Therefore, in this empirical juridical research, the concepts, doctrines, and methods of social science that intersect with the social life of society become one unit in legal studies so that they can understand the law and its problems according to the existing reality. In making conclusions, empirical juridical research uses deductive logic with different research steps from normative juridical research.…”

On meaningful diversity: past, present and future of Wageningen rural sociology

“…Spraying tank with pesticides seeks to strengthen the link between law as a legal science and other social sciences in order to give more depth to the strictly legal analyses. For instance, this theoretical framework allows me to employ both empirical methods and legal analysis of property rights while also affording insights into the interface between the neoliberal land tenure system (legal perspective) and the livelihood strategies of small farmers (social perspective) (Whitehouse & Bright 2016).…”