[Book review] Laws of the postcolonial

Abstract

In 1926 the pioneering social anthropologist Bronislaw Malinowski wrote a short book called: "Crime and Custom in Savage Society". In this book, he challenged the curiously paradoxical notions held by his contemporaries about law in tribal societies. On the one hand "savages" were thought of as lawless people unable to follow a rule. On the other they were conceived as robotic automata, "mechanically" fallowing custom-hallowed norms. He went on to claim that the tribal "customs" he had observed functioned, to all intents and purposes, similarly to a modern legal system. While this identification of law with custom has been heavily criticized, it is the great merit of the text being reviewed here that it explains both the importance of Malinowski's insight and why it continues to be received so tepidly. [excerpt]