Creating a Legal Field: Building Customs and Norms in Modern French Law

When a mason builds, he is bound by two sorts of rules: on one hand, those that guide his movements, taking into account the current norms pertaining to materials and their assembly, in short to technical skill; but also, on the other hand, those that foster the building's social stability, that is to say, peace with its neighbours ensuring property rights and their developments. Construction law is therefore hybrid. It is fuelled on one hand, by technical regulations, of a rather public order, that standardise building rules, but also, on the other, by a customary law of neighbourly relations and of property's fair appraisal, of a rather private order.