Judges’ Interpretive Experiences in Adopting Foreign Legal Principles

Abstract

Comparative law has increasingly recognized the dynamic role of judicial interpretation in integrating foreign legal principles into domestic legal systems. While prior research has focused on normative and structural aspects, little is known about how judges personally experience and interpret these legal transplants in practice. The present study addresses this gap by asking: How do judges experience and make sense of adopting foreign legal concepts in national adjudication? Using an interpretative phenomenological approach, this study explores the lived experiences of senior judges as they navigate the application of foreign legal norms within their own judicial context. Data were collected through in-depth, semi-structured interviews with twelve judges and analyzed using thematic analysis supported by NVivo software. The results reveal five key experiential themes: tension between normative ideals and local realities, interpretative autonomy, emotional ambivalence, strategic adaptation, and institutional constraints. These themes illustrate that judges actively reinterpret foreign legal principles through contextual reasoning, professional identity, and cultural values. The findings contribute to a deeper understanding of comparative judicial practice by highlighting the subjective and interpretative processes behind legal integration, but this study is limited by its relatively small sample size and focus on senior judges, which may not fully capture the diversity of judicial experiences across jurisdictions and court levels. Nevertheless, the insights gained provide practical implications for enhancing judicial training, fostering transnational legal dialogue, and informing policymakers about the challenges and opportunities of integrating foreign legal concepts into broader legal contexts.