Socio-legal Studies on Southeast Asia

Abstract

This special issue is the result of a workshop, Socio-legal Research on Southeast Asia: Themes, Directions, and Challenges, organised at the Centre for Asian Legal Studies (CALS). As the first in a series of academic gatherings planned to advance socio-legal research on Southeast Asia, the workshop brought together leading scholars in the field and researchers from the region. Its goals were to foster an academic community, articulate potential research directions, and thus provide the bases for subsequent conferences and projects that engage the broader field of socio-legal studies while giving voice to Southeast Asian perspectives and experiences. The articles in this volume reflect a key tenet in socio-legal research, that is, the understanding of law as a social institution and legal actors as socially embedded. They also showcase an indepth understanding of local contexts, and the diverse research enquiries and fruitful analysis that socio-legal research on Southeast Asia can offer. We hope that this special issue will contribute to the development of Southeast Asian socio-legal scholarship and an accompanying community of peers.

Keywords: law and society, socio-legal studies, Southeast Asia