The article addresses two questions: 1. Can Legal Realism be seen as a scientific research programme enabling growth of knowledge? To answer that question, the author uses Lakatos’s work on the methodology of scientific research programmes as a frame of reference. 2. What has been the role of American Legal Realism during the first part of the 20th century in helping to develop and implement the New Deal policy vis-a-vis its scientific work? After outlining some characteristics of American Legal Realism and Lakatos’s concept, the author studies LR from this perspective and concludes that LR can at the maximum be seen as a research programme of a very rudimentary nature with largely only a focus on procedures/methods. Despite this conclusion, LR has been important in stimulating questions in which social science research and law came together. Next, the professor-realist-relationship that helped President Roosevelt to have his New Deal developed and implemented is also discussed. A downside of this ‘professor-realist-advisor-partnership’ may have been that a LR scientific research programme has not been developed. Given the increased visibility of New Legal Realism, the paper finally stresses the relevance of working with scientific research programmes and the importance of being on the alert when linking research to (legal) policies.

中文翻译：

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美国法律现实主义：研究计划和政策影响

本文讨论了两个问题：1.法律现实主义能否被视为能够促进知识增长的科学研究计划？为了回答这个问题，作者将Lakatos的科学研究计划方法论作为参考框架。2.在20世纪上半叶，美国法律现实主义在帮助其科学工作中发展和实施新政政策方面发挥了什么作用？在概述了美国法律现实主义和Lakatos的概念的某些特征之后，作者从这个角度研究了LR，并得出结论，LR最多可以看作是一个非常基本的研究程序，主要只关注程序/方法。尽管得出了这个结论，但LR在激发社会科学研究和法律融合在一起的问题方面仍然很重要。下一个，还讨论了帮助罗斯福总统制定和实施新政的教授-现实主义者关系。这种“教授-现实主义者-顾问-合伙人”的弊端可能是尚未开发出LR科学研究计划。鉴于新法律现实主义的知名度越来越高，本文最后强调了开展科学研究计划的相关性以及将研究与（法律）政策联系起来时保持警惕的重要性。