Early Modern Sovereignties Theory and Practice of a Burgeoning Concept in the Netherlands (Legal History Library)

The essays in this volume explore the theories and practices of sovereignty in the context of state-building in the early modern Northern and Southern Low Countries. The Dutch Revolt, the secession of the northern provinces from the Spanish empire, the formation of the Dutch Republic and the reconstitution of Habsburg authority in the south, fostered tense debates among scholars and political leaders about the legitimacy, organisation and processes of law and governance. This made the Low Countries a prime battlefield for theoretical and political contestations about the nature of public authority and the relations between different layers of government in early-modern Europe. The book approaches this historical debate from three angles: (1) political theoretical, (2) legal, and (3) politico-historical.

Contributors are: Hans Blom, Bram De Ridder, Alicia Esteban Estríngana, Simon Groenveld, Gustaaf Janssens, Shavana Musa, José Javier Ruiz Ibáñez, Werner Thomas, Lies van Aelst, Gustaaf van Nifterik, and René Vermeir.

Erik De Bom, Ph.D. (2009), KU Leuven, is Research Fellow at that university. He has published on the history of political thought in the sixteenth and seventeenth century, early-modern intellectual history and Renaissance humanism.
Randall Lesaffer is Professor of legal history at KU Leuven as well as Tilburg University. His research focuses on the historical development of the law of nations in Europa since the sixteenth century. He is general editor of Oxford Historical Treaties and The Cambridge History of International Law.
Werner Thomas is professor of Spanish and Spanish American History at KU Leuven. He publishes on the Low Countries and the Spanish monarchy, the repression of Protestantism in Spain, and the government of Archdukes Albert and Isabella in the Southern Netherlands.