The Third Annual NILG Conference took place at Wageningen University on 29 November 2011. The conference was themed `Law & Governance Beyond the Public-Private Law Divide?. A governance approach focuses on all institutions that pursue policy goals. During the conference, the main question discussed was what this approach means for legal research and legal practice. Is the distinction between public and private law still relevant? Can the governance approach enrich methodologies of legal research? Can this approach further new types of regulation, in which the market or civil society organizations have an important input and/or which require more technical expertise?