The uncertainties which surround any attempt to modify social behaviour through legislation are well recognised. So too is the probability that such uncertainties will multiply in a “plural” context; where, for example, national legislation is imposed upon formerly autonomous groups in the period following their incorporation. But even if we take it for granted that desired behavioural changes are unlikely to appear as direct, matching results of legislative action, we should equally avoid the assumption that law made at the centre will have no impact on the periphery. Even in the absence of efforts towards enforcement, knowledge of an enactment (however slight or incorrect) is likely to be utilised and thus carried over into the sphere of action with results not necessarily foreseen by the legislator. Some response is all the more probable in a case like that of the Tswana, for whom the idea of legislation being used to introduce desired changes was entrenched long before the coming of the Bechuanaland Protectorate (see Schapera, 1943a: 1970).