Premium
Legal Pluralism, Gendered Discourses, and Hybridity in Land‐titling Practices in Cambodia
Author(s) -
Baaz Mikael,
Lilja Mona,
Östlund Allison
Publication year - 2017
Publication title -
journal of law and society
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.263
H-Index - 48
eISSN - 1467-6478
pISSN - 0263-323X
DOI - 10.1111/jols.12023
Subject(s) - hybridity , nexus (standard) , statutory law , ambivalence , sociology , legal pluralism , pluralism (philosophy) , gender studies , political science , law , anthropology , epistemology , comparative law , social psychology , legal realism , psychology , philosophy , computer science , embedded system
This article describes and analyses the tensions, ambivalence, and hybridity that prevail in the nexus between discourses of gender and the legal pluralism of the new, formalized, and customary ways of handling land titles. Based on empirical research in Cambodia, it reveals a number of mechanisms, challenges, and inconsistencies in the practice of land‐titling. Foremost, the practice of titling seems to be highly informed by local discourses of marriage, family, gender, and age, which all affect to whom land is assigned; this leaves a hybrid construction in the nexus between statutory law and customary practices. The article departs from this observation and adds three contributions – on a theoretical level – to existing research: by incorporating the dimensions of discourse analysis and legal hybridity, by linking the concept of legal pluralism to the process of hybridization, and by introducing the notion of hybridity of implementation as a supplement to hybridity of law.