This book takes an interdisciplinary approach to the relationship between law, time, and new technologies to explain the emergence and transformation of global law, with a special focus on platform economy. It describes the 'metamorphoses of global law' on the basis of an experimental understanding of legal theory that looks beyond the systematisation of dogmatic categories, the reproduction of prefabricated theories. It offers a novel and sound theoretical approach to the formation of society within a highly digitalised and platform-oriented world, conjugating the work of several relevant authors, such as Niklas Luhmann, Gunther Teubner, Carl Schmitt, Jürgen Habermas, and Lawrence Lessing, among others. The book answers the myriad questions that the platform economy poses for law, shedding light on the possibility of a hybrid regulation, i.e., the mixture of political-constitutional external regulation and a self-regulation by the digital code, in an attempt to overcome simplistic notions of platform governance. It provides a comprehensive exploratory analysis on the phenomena of digitalisation, platformisation, big data, algorithms, and their relevance to law in global society.

Law and Love in Ovid challenges the view that legal language in poetry is a sign of frivolity and argues that it signals a radical return to the roots of law's creation.

We live in a world that is increasingly difficult to understand. It is not just changing: it is metamorphosing. Change implies that some things change but other things remain the same capitalism changes, but some aspects of capitalism remain as they always were. Metamorphosis implies a much more radical transformation in which the old certainties of modern society are falling away and something quite new is emerging. To grasp this metamorphosis of the world it is necessary to explore the new beginnings, to focus on what is emerging from the old and seek to grasp future structures and norms in the turmoil of the present. Take climate change: much of the debate about climate change has focused on whether or not it is really happening, and if it is, what we can do to stop or contain it. But this emphasis on solutions blinds us to the fact that climate change is an agent of metamorphosis. It has already altered our way of being in the world the way we live in the world, think about the world and seek to act upon the world through our actions and politics. Rising sea levels are creating new landscapes of inequality drawing new world maps whose key lines are not traditional boundaries between nation-states but elevations above sea level. It is creating an entirely different way of conceptualizing the world and our chances of survival within it. The theory of metamorphosis goes beyond theory of world risk society: it is not about the negative side effects of goods but the positive side effects of bads. They produce normative horizons of common goods and propel us beyond the national frame towards a cosmopolitan outlook.

This edited volume examines the role of international law in a changing global order. Can we, under the current significantly changing conditions, still observe an increasing juridification of international relations based on a universal understanding of values? Or are we, to the contrary, facing a tendency towards an informalization or a reformalization of international law, or even an erosion of international legal norms? Would it be appropriate to revisit classical elements of international law in order to react to structural changes, which may give rise to a more polycentric or non-polar world order? Or are we simply observing a slump in the development towards an international rule of law based on a universal understanding of values? In eleven chapters, distinguished scholars reflect on how to approach these questions from historical, system-oriented and actor-centered perspectives. The contributions engage with the rise of European international law since the 17th century, the decay of the international rule of law, compliance as an indicator for the state of international law, international law and informal law-making in times of populism, the rule of environmental law and complex problems, human rights in Europe in a hostile environment, the influence of the BRICS states on international law, the impact of non-state actors on international law, international law's contribution to global justice, the contestation of value-based norms and the international rule of law in light of legitimacy claims.

In The Metamorphosis of Criminal Justice, Jacqueline S. Hodgson focuses on the potentially radical and fundamental changes taking place within criminal justice in Britain and in France and the ways that these are driven by wider domestic, European or international concerns. This metamorphosis away from established values and practices is eroding what were once regarded as core rights and freedoms in the name of efficiency, security, and justice to victims. Beginning with a comparative analysis of adversarial and inquisitorial procedural values and traditions, and an examination of broad trends in domestic and European criminal justice, Hodgson then discusses how the roles of prosecution and defense have been re-shaped in different ways in both jurisdictions--both in the text of the law and in their practices. The final section considers how systems within different procedural traditions adapt to address, or provide a remedy for, systemic flaws that produce wrongful convictions and in particular, the role of the defense in these procedures. By adopting an empirical and comparative approach, this book explores the nature and reach of these trends and the ways that they challenge and disrupt criminal processes and values.

This book offers a comprehensive analysis of the law of treaties based on the interplay between the 1969 Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties and customary international law. Written by a team of renowned international lawyers, it offers new insight into the basic concepts and methodology of the law of treaties and its problems.