Investigations at the Native American site complex of Stark Farms in Mississippi, USA, have yielded numerous examples of metal artifacts of European origin. Our study suggests that they derive from contact between the AD 1540–1541 winter encampment of the Spanish Hernando de Soto expedition and the local Indigenous polity. The artifacts display a wide range of modifications, uses, and depositional contexts congruent with hybrid practices. We argue that the early colonial setting of Stark Farms requires a different perspective on cultural mixing than is often applied in studies of European colonialism. This is highlighted by the strongly improvisational nature of the modification of the metal objects, embodying a political climate in which European incursions were precarious and in which hybridity and power were heterogeneous and fluid.

The Commission on Legal Empowerment of the Poor has made a considerable contribution to the international development community by focusing attention on concrete legal needs of impoverished populations. As such, it constitutes a fine start for international, regional and domestic efforts to pull together a legal empowerment agenda that will directly benefit such groups. Nevertheless, the Commission's report falls short in key respects. It displays an inordinate faith in employing rational persuasion to grapple with a widespread problem it highlights – how to get self-interested politicians and other elites to forfeit their own advantage for the well-being of society. It is similarly stumbles in addressing how to best implement ambitious legal reforms, so that they have actual impact and do not simply exist on paper. And it does not reconcile the Commission's fundamentally top-down approach with an area of development that is bottom-up in nature. Going forward, it is important to build on the Commission's good start, but depart from its false and even counterproductive steps; the international community should instead draw on successful country-specific legal empowerment experience from diverse contexts. This features increased investment in civil society efforts to make the rule of law a reality, since such initiatives have a better track record than government-centered programs that mainly rely on elite good will. It more specifically involves enhanced long-term funding for domestic and international NGO efforts, both in the form of legal services for the disadvantaged and by integrating such services into broader socioeconomic development programs. The international community should also support impact-oriented applied research and move toward establishing a Millennium Development Goal for legal empowerment

In this article I will first present the main thrust of Hernando de Soto's design, and then summarize praise and criticisms of his work. Next, I will address the question of to what extent De Soto's design is innovative. To this end I present a brief overview of past experience. I will then introduce some preliminary results of an international Leiden-based research project that has addressed the general causal relations between legalization, tenure security and poverty alleviation which constitute the basis of De Soto's argument. Most case studies of this project found that for De Soto's plans to be effective, a range of conditions had to be fulfilled. As long as these conditions are not fulfilled – which happens to be the unfortunate reality throughout the developing world – his plans will not work. Unfortunately, his proposals then are based on a whole set of unrealistic assumptions. Finally, in order to place De Soto's work in the context of today's development policies, with their emphasis on good governance and rule of law promotion, I will present a conceptual scheme which unpacks the key concepts of development, governance and the rule of law. In the concluding part I speculate on what we can learn from the success of De Soto's compelling theories, and from various criticisms of and responses to them How can these lessons be beneficial for a realistic rule of law promotion?