WHAT IS LEGAL RESEARCH?

Legal research, taking clue from the meaning of research as outlined in the preceding pages, may
be defined as systematic investigation towards increasing the sum of knowledge of law. However, a
scholar has commented that this definition is too broad and lacks articulation and proposed a
different definition. He observed: Research may be defined as systematic fact-finding (that is, to find
what the law is on a particular point) and advancement of the science of law. In a strict sense, legal
research is understood as limited to those works which contribute to the advancement of legal science
(that is excluding such materials as text-books and case books, etc.) This is a too narrow a view of
research and we need not adopt such a restricted definition of legal research. Even the fact-finding is
not so easy as it may seem. First, a researcher has to go into the different statutory provisions and the
rules made thereunder. Secondly, he may have to examine the mass of case-law which may have
accumulated on the point in issue, and it is not an easy matter to derive a clear-cut legal proposition
from the tangled mass of case-law.
To advance the science of law, it is necessary for a researcher to go into the underlying principles or
reasons of the law. The enquiries will have to be: Why a particular rule? What led to its adoption?
What are its effects? Whether it is suited to the present conditions? How can it be improved?
Whether it needs to be replaced entirely by a new rule? 21 Thus, the term legal research take into its
ambit a systematic finding or ascertaining law on the identified topic or in the given area as well
as an inquiry into law with a view to making advancement in the science of law.
21 S

N Jain, Legal Research and Methodology, 14 Jr of Ind L Inst 487 (1972), at 490.

Finding law on a particular subject, as stated earlier, is not an easy task. There may be a number of
statutes (as well as statutory provisions scattered in different statutes) with frequent amendments on
the subject under inquiry. In addition, these statutes and
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Legal research, therefore, takes into its ambit:

1. Doctrinal Research- It is a research into legal rules, principles, concepts or doctrines. It involves a
rigorous systematic exposition, analysis and critical evaluation of legal rules, principles or doctrines
and their inter-relationship. It arranges the existing law in order and provides thematic parameters for
such an order. It also concerns with critical review of legislations and of decisional processes and
their underlying policy.
2. Empirical investigations- It assesses impact of law and reveals the gap between legal idealism and
social reality. Perceiving the idea of law as a social phenomenon, a researcher explores social,
political, economic and cultural dimensions or implications of law.
4. Reform-oriente

statutory provisions may be supplemented from time to time by a bulk of rules, regulations, orders,
directives and government resolutions. Similarly, one (particularly in the common law jurisdictions)
requires to look for pouring judicial pronouncements of the higher judicial institutions interpreting
these provisions for finding true meaning and ambit of the legal provisions. A quest for making
advancement in the science of law requires a legal researcher to systematically probe into underlying
principles of, and reasons for, law. Thus, legal research has a very wide scope as it, in ultimate
analysis, involves an inquiry into one or the other dimension or aspect of law.
Legal research is, thus the process of identifying and retrieving information necessary to support
legal decision-making. It includes in it each step of a course of action that begins with an analysis of
the facts of a problem and concludes with the application and communication of the results of the
investigation.

Nature and Scope of Legal Research

A Welfare and Democratic State envisages socio-economic transformation for the development of a
just social order based on equality and socio-economic justice. Constitution of such a country
invariably contemplates extensive use of law for bringing about the desired socio-economic
transformation of the social order. It allows, rather expects, the state to use its legislative power to
bring about such a change. Any serious step by the state towards social amelioration and economic
progress requires legislation and legal authority. Law, therefore, acts as a catalytic agent for such
socio-economic transformation.
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However, in a democratic political set-up, the legislative processes have to be informed by public
opinion. At the same time, public opinion is required to be changed through legislative process and
concretization.22 A good Legislator ought to know the coercion-potential of the laws and how much
social resistance they can withstand. He must, among other things, to know the social mores, habits,
and culture. Similarly, he must be able to take a realistic estimate of the effect of law by taking into
account its inherent strengths and weaknesses. Jeremy Bentham talked of legislation as a science and
wanted all the laws to be restructured on the touchstone of utility. Roscoe Pound conceived law as an
instrument of social engineering. Both, therefore, visualized legislation on rational, humanistic and
pragmatic basis. Such legislation requires an ongoing research into the facts and also of the
interaction between the law and social & human behavior. If we find that most of the social welfare
legislations have failed to bring the desired changes or transformation, it may be because they were
not planned systematically and no cost-benefit analysis was done at their formulation stage. Law has
to be preceded by a serious study of the dynamics of law and social changes. In the absence of such a
study, law is bound to be ineffective and an utter failure in its mission. It would reduce merely to a
legislative dcor and symbolic. A set of questions, therefore, warrants a careful and critical
investigation. Prominent among them are: Why is a legislation made? What are the forces, lobbies or
pressure groups that activated the legislation, and for what reasons or objectives? What are the forces
or pressure groups that opposed the legislation and on what grounds? What led to its adoption? What
are its contemplated effects? How much is the success percentage of it as a social legislation? Why
did the law become dysfunctional? Why it remained un-operationalized or less-operatinalized? What
corrective measures need to take to make it more effective? Does it merely need some modifications
or replacement by a new statute?
22 See,

Albert Venn Dicey, Lectures on the Relation between Law and Public Opinion in England during the Nineteenth
Century (MacMillan & Co, London, 1924), Lectures I, II & III; Morris Ginsberg, Law and Opinion in England in the
Twentieth Century, (1959), and Julius Stone, Social Dimensions of Law and Justice (Stanford University, Stanford, 1966).

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Doctrinal legal research, as conceived in the legal research domain, is research about what the
prevailing state of legal doctrine, legal rule, or legal principle is. A legal scholar undertaking
doctrinal legal research, therefore, takes one or more legal propositions, principles, rules or doctrines
as a starting point and focus of his study. He locates such a principle, rule or doctrine in statutory
instrument(s), judicial opinions thereon, discussions thereof in legal treatises, commentaries,
textbooks, encyclopedias, legal periodicals, and debates, if any, that took place at the formative stage
of such a rule, doctrine or proposition. Thereafter, he reads them in a holistic manner and makes an
analysis of the material as well as of the rules, doctrines and formulates his conclusions and writes
up his study. For example, a legal researcher interested in criminal law might start with proposition
dealing with right against self- incrimination. Research then takes place in the law library, where he
will locate the proposition (along with its different contours) and its discussions in treatises and
textbooks on criminal law, criminal procedure, and constitutional law, encyclopedia and leading legal
periodicals. He will also try to locate all relevant judicial pronouncements of the higher judicial
institutions delved into the right against self-incrimination. He will then read these materials and
analyze them by applying his power of reasoning and will, premised on analytical perspective and
the material used, draw some conclusions about the proposition. He then will write up his study. He
may, in his study advance a set of formulations, supportive or otherwise, with convincing reasoning
about the proposition-the right against self-incrimination. He, in his research report, may offer an
alternative comprehensive paradigm of the doctrine. With a view to drawing parallels between the
doctrine or rule under inquiry, he may also find a comparable doctrine or rule from other
jurisdictions. He may, depending upon objectives of his research, also propose a new formulation of
the rule or doctrine, a model statute or a statutory provision. He may also highlight the purpose and
policy of law that exist and may propose what it ought to be. Doctrinal legal research, thus, involves:
(i) systematic analysis of statutory provisions and of legal principles involved therein, or derived
therefrom, and (ii) logical and rational ordering of the legal propositions and principles. The
researcher gives emphasis on substantive law rules, doctrines, concepts and judicial pronouncements.
He organizes his study around legal propositions and judicial pronouncements on the legal
propositions of the appellate courts, and other conventional legal materials, such as parliamentary
debates, revealing the legislative intent, policy and history of the rule or doctrine. Classic works of
legal scholars on the law of torts and administrative law do furnish outstanding examples of doctrinal
legal research. Doctrinal legal research, in addition to analytical one, may be historical or
comparative.66 Historical legal research, unlike analytical one, deals with the past. It throws light on
the past to understand the present.