The course approaches comparative law and legal studies from a genuine global perspective. It provides students with an overview of the most important legal traditions of the world, questioning state-centered paradigms and investigating current legal transformations. The first part of the course focuses on the meaning of comparative law and introduces fundamental concepts, such as those of legal traditions, legal transplants and legal pluralism, considering legal globalization as one of the most important developments for contemporary legal studies. The second part deals with the core of the Western legal traditions analyzing the Common law & Civil law archetypical divide. It also analyses mixed legal systems, their distinctive traits and growing importance for comparative legal studies. The meaning of democracy and human rights as Western or universal values is investigated as well in this part of the course, through concrete case studies and via class debates.
Equivalencies: Comparado
