One Law for All? / Eigene und fremde Welten Bd.25 (PDF)

in the sociological "world polity" approach (see, in particular, Boyle and Meyer 2002), it faces a twofold problem: analyses of diffusion tend to claim either the obvious or the impossible. If diffusion is taken to refer "only" to the imitation of Western law in different parts of the world, it is a commonplace. Mimesis is part of most legal reform processes. On the other hand, the spread and use of European legal norms and institutions is best not discussed in terms of a transfer of laws from one country to another. As critics of Watson's concept of "legal transplants" (1974) have argued, such transfer is impossible since the law consists not only of words but also of the culturally specific meanings attached to these words (Legrand 2001). As a result, any analysis of legal borrowing must not only take local adaptations and reinterpretations into account but also acknowledge the complete novelty of the resulting laws. Regardless of these caveats, "one law for all" remains valid not only as an ideal for lawmakers. Thanks to its multi-dimensionality, it can also be a useful guide for inquiry. It directs our attention to the dynamic relationship between two competing, but often overlapping, trends that characterize most imperial and post-imperial spaces: legal integration, on the one hand, and the recognition and promotion of difference, on the other. The latter, at times, even included forms of legal segregation. Framing the inquiry in such terms allows an analysis of different steps towards, or away from, legal equality while revealing an array of local interactions with Western law(s). The role of "Western" law must indeed be given careful consideration. A focus on East-West or North-South interaction admittedly runs the danger of being charged with "Eurocentrism"; and past inquiries into the role of Western legal blueprints and institutions in the South, such as the Yale Law and Modernization project in the early 1970s, have been rightly criticized for their developmental assumptions, that is, the idea that the adoption of "one type of law-that found in the West-[was] essential for economic, political and social development in the Third World" (Trubek 1972, 2; see also Trubek and Galanter 1974). This volume, by contrast, has no interest in extolling or denouncing any particular normative order. Yet, it suggests that a close consideration of interactions with Western laws is helpful-in fact, it is necessary-for a cross-cultural discussion of legal debate and practice in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. In many parts of the globe, European legal reforms and institutions were among the most common points of reference at this time, as efforts to rationalize local judicial systems and make them more efficient gained momentum. Policies of centralization and the standardization of legal practice were meant to create both stability and a minimum of legal certainty. This frequently involved an overhaul of laws and legal institutions in accordance with European models, or at least a partial appropriation of such models. Legal reforms were usually designed and presented as part of the wider project of "modernization" and linked to related efforts in the political, economic and cultural spheres. Subscribing to the idea of universal, mono-linear progress and Europe's advanced position on this developmental path, many elites were convinced that non-European regions could learn from the experience of European nations-usually by following their lead, but sometimes also by avoiding previous mistakes. To be fair, there was no such thing as a singular "Western model". The legal reality in Europe was a multitude of different and differently interpreted models. Thus, it is worth exploring which of these (and why!) Russian, Latin American, Afghan and other reformers decided to draw upon. What is more: how did local actors re-interpret and adapt these models to local circumstances? For reform movements throughout the South and East, "modernization" often consisted of a selective re-combination of European and local ideas and practices (in which the former were discussed less in terms of their "superiority" than in terms of their compatibility with the latter). The resulting, new legal systems could then be promoted as regional models. The new Turkish legal system of the mid-1920s, for example, though based on a mixture of Swiss, Italian, German and French influences (Orucu 1992), soon became a reference point in neighboring Muslim majority states. The question of borrowings and references in legal debate and practice, then, forms one key set of questions addressed in the chapters that follow. This volume is also designed to examine the discrepancy between the claims of reformers, on the one hand, and the implementation and reception of legal change, on the other. It highlights the simultaneous development of growing uniformity in some areas of law, both within and between countries, and diversity in others. The promotion of universal legal norms in reform debates and the resulting legal institutions often bore striking similarities whereas legal practice often remained idiosyncratic, not least because local actors behaved pragmatically. All cases discussed in this volume were legally "plural" in one way or another. Local administrators, judges and litigants could pursue their own agendas by drawing on different legal traditions at different times. In short, this volume examines law as both debate and practice in the imperial and post-imperial world. Case studies from Latin America, Russia, Africa and East Asia explore the ways in which rulers, parliamentarians, jurists, mid-level bureaucrats and ordinary people talk about and actively use the law. Before introducing the individual chapters by identifying a number of common themes, I briefly discuss the role and meaning of law in (post-)imperial contexts and offer a short summary of the disciplinary background and premises on which this volume is based.