BOOK: Balázs FEKETE, Paradigms in Modern European Comparative Law - A History (Oxford: Hart Publishing, 2021). ISBN 9781509946921, 63.00 GBP

 

(Source: Hart Publishing)

Hart is publishing a new book on paradigms in modern European comparative law.

ABOUT THE BOOK

This book uses the philosophy of Thomas Kuhn to provide a new vision of the development of European comparative law that will challenge and inspire scholars in the field.

With the 'empathic' use of some ideas from Kuhn's theories on the history of science – paradigm, paradigm-shift, puzzle-solving research and incommensurability – the book rethinks the modern history of European comparative law from the late 19th century to the modern day.

It argues that three major paradigms determine modern comparative law:

- historical and comparative jurisprudence,

- droit comparé, and

- post-World War II comparative law.

It concludes that contemporary methodological trends are not signs of a paradigm-shift toward a postmodern and culturalist understanding of comparative law, but that the new approach spreads the idea of methodological plurality.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Balázs Fekete is Associate Professor at the Eötvös Loránd University Faculty of Law and Senior Research Fellow at the Centre of Social Sciences Institute for Legal Studies, Hungary.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Acknowledgments

 

Introduction: Scope and Subject

I. The History of Comparative Law and a History of Comparative Law

II. The Dominance of Descriptive Linearity

III. Comparative Law as a Discipline and the Application of Comparative Methods in Law

IV. Ancient or Modern History of Comparative Law Thinking

V. Comparative Law and Comparative Constitutional Law

VI. A Mezzo-Perspective Approach

 

1. The History of Comparative Law and Kuhn's Oeuvre

I. Studying Science as a Historical Phenomenon: Some Preliminaries

II. Applying Kuhn's Legacy to Understand the History of Comparative Legal Studies

III. Lessons from Kuhn in the Historiography of Legal Scholarship

 

2. Historical-Comparative Jurisprudence

I. Introduction: The Centuries-Long Pre-Paradigm Period and the Rise of the First Paradigm

II. Prologue: The Modern Precursors and the Pre-Paradigm Period

III. General Background: The Rise of Positivism and the Idea of Evolution

IV. Historical and Comparative Jurisprudence – The Emergence of the Paradigm in England

V. From Ethnologische Jurisprudenz to Vergleichende Rechtswissenschaft – The Birth of a Paradigm in Germany

VI. The First Paradigm of Modern Comparative Law: A Summary

 

3. The Paradigm of Droit Comparé

I. Fin-de-siècle Atmosphere

II. A New Wave of Institutionalisation

III. The 1900 Paris Congress of Comparative Law

IV. The Establishment of the New Paradigm

V. The Development of the Paradigm – Functionalism, Global Law and Skepticism

VI. Characteristics of the Second Paradigm

 

4. The Third Paradigm – Post-World War II Comparative Law

I. Introductory Remarks: The New World Order and Comparative Law Scholarship

II. The Taxonomy of the World's Legal Orders

III. The Renewal of Comparative Law Methodology – The Victory of Functionalism

IV. The Third Paradigm

 

5. New Trends in Contemporary Comparative Law: Toward a Paradigm Shift?

I. A Changing Scholarly Landscape

II. A Cultural Turn in Comparative Law?

III. The Decline of Methodological Exclusivity in Comparative Law Thinking

IV. Paradigm Shift in Comparative Law?

 

Concluding Thoughts

I. On the Validity of This Research, with Special Regard to the Relevance of Kuhn's Ideas

II. On the Utility of Having a Single Book on the History of Modern European Comparative Law

III. On Recent Perspectives of Comparative Law

 

Bibliography

 

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