Legal Scholarship at the Threshold of a New Millennium

Abstract

Scholarship has already warned us to soundness in relation to modernisationist legal reforms. For it consistently (1) emphasised the framework-creating nature of the otherwise prevailing social normativity, and its primordial role in determining social processes, (2) put the possibility and demand of organicity with every step in the limelight, (3) did not consider the effectiveness of initiating elitist actions to influence overall social movements plannable for the long run and with lasting effects. Therefore, it regarded any regulatory legal intervention as the primarily symbolic confirmation with sanctioning of the direction otherwise ongoing movements were taking, (4) warned to the damages caused by any adventurer policy in as much as they not only fail, but discredit even the thought of change itself. Therefore, it (5) gave voice to the advantage of a systematically planned, consistent, convincing, pragmatic, and all-comprehensive social programme, as opposed to the occasional temptations of worldcuring intentions, exposed to the alternate danger of sudden forwarding and quick tiring, supported solely by intellectual arguments.