The case study in legal research: a methodology for a deep understanding of law

Abstract

The present work had as its primary objective the analysis and systematization of a proposal concerning the methodological value of the case study in legal research, in such a way that it would serve as a conceptual, practical, and argumentative guide to demonstrate the usefulness of the case study beyond its traditional definition, which tends to understand it as merely a judicial file.

To this end, a qualitative methodology was employed, which relied on its doctrinal sources on the handling, unification, and paraphrasing of such academic foundations throughout the proposal. This was complemented by an analytical and explanatory approach aimed at reconstructing the notion of the case, its components, elements, taxonomy, functions, and tools for its application within the field of law.

The case study was also presented in the proposal through an applied example involving a case of negligent homicide within the Panamanian criminal justice system, which helped illustrate how this methodology would operate in a specific legal situation.

Among its main findings, it was determined that the case study has a clear capacity to simultaneously articulate facts, norms, actors, contexts, and institutions within a complex unit of analysis. This allows it to describe legal phenomena, contextualize them, humanize them, and connect them with broader frameworks or disciplines.

Consequently, the case study is optimized as a particularly suitable methodology for strengthening contemporary legal research—not only because it offers a pathway to address the conceptual diversity of law as a social phenomenon (thereby improving the researcher’s argumentative rigor), but also because it enables a more concrete, rigorous, and critical approach to legal problems within a broader context.