Why must legal ideas be interpreted sociologically?

Sociology of law and socio-legal studies are sometimes declared unable to give insight into the nature of legal ideas or to clarify questions about legal doctrine. The idea that law has its own 'truth' - its own way of seeing the world - has been used to deny that sociological perspectives have any special claim to provide understanding of law as doctrine. This paper tries to specify what sociological understanding of legal ideas entails. It argues that such an understanding is not merely useful but necessary for legal studies. Legal scholarship entails sociological understanding of law. The two are inseparable.