Modernisation, National Identity and Legal Instrumentalism (Vol. II: Public Law) Studies in Comparative Legal History (Legal History Library)

The driving force of the dynamic development of world legal history in the past few centuries, with the dominance of the West, was clearly the demands of modernisation – transforming existing reality into what is seen as modern. The need for modernisation, determining the development of modern law, however, clashed with the need to preserve cultural identity rooted in national traditions. With selected examples of different legal institutions, countries and periods, the authors of the essays in the two volumes Modernisation, National Identity and Legal Instrumentalism: Studies in Comparative Legal History, vol. I: Private Law and Modernisation, National Identity and Legal Instrumentalism: Studies in Comparative Legal History, vol. II: Public Law seek to explain the nature of this problem.

Contributors are Judit Beke-Martos, Jiří Brňovják, Marjorie Carvalho de Souza, Michał Gałędek, Imre Képessy, Ivan Kosnica, Simon Lavis, Maja Maciejewska-Szałas, Tadeusz Maciejewski, Thomas Mohr, Balázs Pálvölgyi, and Marek Starý.

Michał Gałędek Ph.D. (2010), University of Gdańsk, is Professor in the Department of Legal History, Faculty of Law and Administration. In his research he focuses on the Polish administration, judiciary, constitutionalism, and political thought at the beginning of the 19th century and in the interwar period.

Anna Klimaszewska Ph.D. (2011), University of Gdańsk, is Assistant Professor in the Department of Legal History, Faculty of Law and Administration. In her research she focuses on the influence exerted by the French law on the shape of the Polish legal system, commercial law, civil procedure and national legal identity in the 19th century.