van der Burg, Wibren --- "The need for audacious, fully armed scholars: Concluding reflections" [2016] ELECD 1015; in Taekema, Sanne; Klink, van Bart; Been, de Wouter (eds), "Facts and Norms in Law" (Edward Elgar Publishing, 2016) 265

Book Title: Facts and Norms in Law

Editor(s): Taekema, Sanne; Klink, van Bart; Been, de Wouter

Publisher: Edward Elgar Publishing

ISBN (hard cover): 9781785361081

Section: Chapter 12

Section Title: The need for audacious, fully armed scholars: Concluding reflections

Author(s): van der Burg, Wibren

Number of pages: 22

Abstract/Description:

This final chapter is not a concluding one in which everything is nicely integrated. Today’s legal research – as reflected in this volume – is too diverse for that; more importantly, however, pluralism and perspectivism are unavoidable, and should even be valued in a positive manner. Therefore, the author merely provides some tentative reflections from his own selective perspective. First, he situates the various contributions and suggests some distinctions that might be helpful to understand the differences. Second, he discusses Péter Cserne’s suggestion of a tension between legal episteme and the episteme of the empirical sciences, and argues that we should adopt a more pluralist understanding of Lon Fuller to enrich his analysis. He then argues that we need to pay closer attention to normative research projects that are oriented towards evaluation and normative recommendation. The author concludes by distinguishing different types of interdisciplinary research, and examines how the relation between facts and norms plays a role in each of these types.