a kaleidoscope of people Tracing the impacts of legal families at the ECtHRthrough interviews, and starting with the main divide between common or civil law backgrounds, the examples point to differences in opinion about the importance of oral arguments and hearings, or about access to justice, for as one said, ‘of course, you feel the different legal traditions here. For example you see that the common law lawyers give much more importance on the arguing in the court and the hearing; whereas it is terrifying to me, if some continental judges say, let’s just assume how it would be when it is this or that and then they decide’.32 Questions may arise because of different assumptions about the importance of a title to property, or individual responsibility for the judgment.33 On closer analysis several variations between legal families were seen. On a more general level, in family matters or protecting property, Scandinavian countries were seen to take a more relaxed line on state intervention than Southern European countries. The majority of the interviewed judges suggested these national differences actually make a difference when discussing particularities, but not on apermanent level. In these cases, stronger discussions on the bench on protected scope of rights are likely, and different experiences might be shared while supporting the legal arguments. Most of these perceived differences that originate in legal family backgrounds concerned the style of how to tackle acase rather than the legal argument itself. The findings at the CJEUshowed that the differences of background in legal families can be grouped in three categories of significance. Two have immediate impact and either concern the styles of how to present legal arguments or are used as valuable experience for ‘interlocking’ or ‘pulse-taking’. The category with less immediate impact concerns legal principles and doctrines that influence the court in the long-term.34 Employing different styles linked to legal family background would be 32 See Arold 2007, 75. 33 Ibid. 77. 34 See Arold Lorenz et al. 2013, 111. 307 Legal families
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