Between Hobbes’s Leviathan and Smith’s Invisible Hand: Empirical and Interdisciplinary Legal Research on Formal and Informal Institutions in Trust Relations

Why are transactions involving trust managed in very different ways? In this inaugural lecture - delivered on the acceptance of the Chair of Empirical Legal Studies at the Erasmus School of Law, Erasmus University Rotterdam - Professor Vincent Buskens shows that contracts and other forms of regulation used in trust situations vary and depend on economic, psychological, social, and legal aspects of the transaction. The research on trust is used to demonstrate why legal scholars need to incorporate an interdisciplinary behavioral approach. Such an approach is necessary to reach a better understanding of the effects of changes in regulation on behavior of actors affected by the regulation. In addition, Buskens discusses research methods to obtain empirical evidence about effects of changes in regulation. (Series: Civilology Civilologie - Vol. 1)