Abstract
The first four papers in this issue come out of a project examining the relations between law, culture and things. They inquire into human links with the material world. These links are mediated through technology which, in its many forms, enables humans to fulfil material needs. Tools and their social organisation provide food, clothing, shelter and communication. This deep imbrication with all facets of our lives means that the ways technology is used and organised have profound importance for humanity and the environment. Technologies can be categorised as ‘hard’, involving manufacture and transport; ‘soft’ information and communication technologies; and ‘wet’ technologies of human sustenance, such as food production and preparation. Law regulates or constitutes each of these in one way or another, while it is most often associated with soft technologies used in record-keeping and artificial intelligence. This collection of papers examines the use of soft technology in law, as well as law as a means of directing the uses of technologies that impinge on the natural environment and the human body. These papers explore human and legal relations with technology and nature: legal records and decision-making; food and nutrition at the intersection of law, science and culture; rights of and to land and nature; and human responsibility for the environment and the impact of technology. 
 The authors of the four papers in this collection would like to acknowledge the contributions of the participants in an earlier discussion of this work at the “Linking Generations for Global Justice” conference of the Research Committee on Sociology of Law in Oñati, Spain on 20 June 2019.
Highlights
Law, Culture and Things: Human Links to the Material Richard MohrSocial Research, Policy and Planning Pty LtdThe following four papers come out of a project examining the relations between law, culture and things.1 They inquire into human links with the material world
While law is transmitted between generations in written and symbolic forms, it is transmitted viscerally
Health and ethical codes governing the propriety and safety of food are expressed through various legal means, from codes and regulations to judicial decisions
Summary
The following four papers come out of a project examining the relations between law, culture and things. They inquire into human links with the material world. Law regulates or constitutes each of these in one way or another, while it is most often associated with soft technologies used in record-keeping and artificial intelligence This collection of papers examines the use of soft technology in law, as well as law as a means of directing the uses of technologies that impinge on the natural environment and the human body. In the past the very materiality of law’s objects – their solidity, presence and perseverance over time – have served to authorise and legitimise the law, as well as to conserve its substantive content This persistence and conservation outlasted the authority and memory of any human actor and enabled the law to be transmitted from one generation to the next.
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