state >acquires nothing =. Both Hewlett, which deals with laws that purport to >cancel= an existing state debt, and Harksen, which concerns a law that transfers property to an officer of the court to protect the interests of creditors, illustrate the danger of distinguishing between deprivation(by way of regulation) and expropriation of property on the basis of the question whether the state acquires anything in the process. However difficult the distinction between deprivation and expropriation of property may be to make, courts ought to follow a more sophisticated approach than is evident from Hewlett The considerations set out in the previous paragraphs indicate that academic and jud icial discourse on the problem of regulation of intangible commercial property has not come to terms et with the fact that contemporary property law, especially in the constitutional area, has moved away from its pre-modern roots in the social and economic appreciation of tangible things and the ways in which they are regulated by the modern state. The insistent focus on the classic image of expropriation as a physical taking away and concomitant state acquisition of tangible things(especially land) seems to suggest a lack of theoretical insight in the fundamental changes that characterise property law(and law in general) since the advent of modern society, and particularly in the changes that result from the social and economic(not to mention political) importance of state control over the use and exploitation of intangible(and commercial) property in modern society. There is also a lack of awareness of what >context= really means in the adjudication of constitutional cases the broader the brush with which different cases are painted into a single category, the less chance of taking full account of the unique features and circumstances that surround each case in fact. This article is an attempt to move towards greater awareness of these changes differences and their implications especially in the analysis of constitutional case law The case study of Harksen and its reference to the Zimbabwean decisions in Hewlett and Davies illustrates some of the problems surrounding the regulation of intangible commercial property rights: unless the characteristics and unique features of different cases in the field of regulation of intangible property are distinguished and accounted for quite carefully, decisions and the reasoning behind them will suffer from unnecessary inconsistency and lack of clarity This means not only that injustice is done to the ind ividual rights in question, but also that there is insufficient attention for the social, economic and political importance and implications of control and regulation of (intangible) property rights. In the rest of this paper I propose to analyse cases dealing with the regulation of intangible commercial property by distinguishing between a number of situations where this problem assumes different forms and requires different approaches and solutions. In each category I discuss a number of cases to illustrate some of the characteristic features of the problem and the possible solutions that might or might not suit those features 3. Regulatory cancellation of state debts One of the most controversial areas where the regulation of intangible commercial property results in claims that the results of regulation are expropriatory or confiscatory, is the regulato cancellation of state debts. Some of the cases that feature in this category involve private rather than commercial property(debts), but these cases are nevertheless often confused with some of the other categories discussed below, and although the cases involve private property there is10 state >acquires nothing=. Both Hewlett, which deals with laws that purport to >cancel= an existing state debt, and Harksen, which concerns a law that transfers property to an officer of the court to protect the interests of creditors, illustrate the danger of distinguishing between deprivation (by way of regulation) and expropriation of property on the basis of the question whether the state acquires anything in the process. However difficult the distinction between deprivation and expropriation of property may be to make, courts ought to follow a more sophisticated approach than is evident from Hewlett. The considerations set out in the previous paragraphs indicate that academic and judicial discourse on the problem of regulation of intangible commercial property has not come to terms yet with the fact that contemporary property law, especially in the constitutional area, has moved away from its pre-modern roots in the social and economic appreciation of tangible things and the ways in which they are regulated by the modern state. The insistent focus on the classic image of expropriation as a physical taking away and concomitant state acquisition of tangible things (especially land) seems to suggest a lack of theoretical insight in the fundamental changes that characterise property law (and law in general) since the advent of modern society, and particularly in the changes that result from the social and economic (not to mention political) importance of state control over the use and exploitation of intangible (and commercial) property in modern society. There is also a lack of awareness of what >context= really means in the adjudication of constitutional cases: the broader the brush with which different cases are painted into a single category, the less chance of taking full account of the unique features and circumstances that surround each case in fact. This article is an attempt to move towards greater awareness of these changes, differences and their implications, especially in the analysis of constitutional case law. The case study of Harksen and its reference to the Zimbabwean decisions in Hewlett and Davies illustrates some of the problems surrounding the regulation of intangible commercial property rights: unless the characteristics and unique features of different cases in the field of regulation of intangible property are distinguished and accounted for quite carefully, decisions and the reasoning behind them will suffer from unnecessary inconsistency and lack of clarity. This means not only that injustice is done to the individual rights in question, but also that there is insufficient attention for the social, economic and political importance and implications of control and regulation of (intangible) property rights. In the rest of this paper I propose to analyse cases dealing with the regulation of intangible commercial property by distinguishing between a number of situations where this problem assumes different forms and requires different approaches and solutions. In each category I discuss a number of cases to illustrate some of the characteristic features of the problem and the possible solutions that might or might not suit those features. 3. Regulatory cancellation of state debts One of the most controversial areas where the regulation of intangible commercial property results in claims that the results of regulation are expropriatory or confiscatory, is the regulatory cancellation of state debts. Some of the cases that feature in this category involve private rather than commercial property (debts), but these cases are nevertheless often confused with some of the other categories discussed below, and although the cases involve private property there is