In the course of the twentieth century governing authorities have taken on an increasingly wider range of responsibilities. Consequently, citizens have developed high expectations regarding their government's ability to satisfy their needs. When citizens put forward their wishes and raise their complaints, they tend to focus on the national government. However, the regulatory powers of the nation state are being increasingly transferred to other actors: to the European and international level, but also to local authorities and private actors. Due to these shifts in governance, many of the classical instruments for containing state power might fail to offer citizens an adequate degree of protection. The question is therefore to what extent the traditional system of legal protection is still satisfactory in a society that is characterized by extensive governing powers and multilevel governance. This collection of essays explores how, in the areas of law enforcement and adjudication, the basic principles of the rule of law can be embedded in a system of multilevel governance. The contributions are divided into three themes. The first theme concerns the search for transnational justice. These contributions deal with the problems caused by the growing interdependence between national states. A second set of contributions focuses on the changing position of the courts in a system of multilevel governance and the democratic basis for this change. The third group of articles, finally, deals with several basic concepts of law and society which may be used to describe the shifts in governance, while focusing on the role of private autonomy at different levels of government.
Oswald Jansen focuses his research on European and Comparative Administrative Law, Administrative Sanctions and Financial and Economic Administrative Law. He has extensive experience teaching legal professionals in administrative law such as judges, attorneys, lawyers specialized in drafting legislations and other civil servants. He has experience as a supplementary judge in regional courts dealing with both administrative law and criminal law cases and as a deputy-councillor of the Central Appeals Tribunal (Centrale Raad van Beroep) and as attorney (advocaat) specialised in administrative law cases. His research interests are moving more and more towards the combination of International, European and comparative administrative law and comparative administration. Next to his position as senior lecturer constitutional and administrative law at Utrecht University, he is Endowed Professor European Administrative Law and Public Administration at Maastricht University and legal counsel and attorney of the city of The Hague. He was guest professor at the Sorbonne Law School (Paris) in 2014. In 2013 he was and in 2015 he will be guest professor at the Law school of the Beijing Normal University (China).
