JOURNAL: Acta Universitatis George Bacovia. Juridica

The new issue of Acta Universitatis George Bacovia. Juridica has been published. The issue is available here. 

The journal is described as:

We have proposed ourselves, as main objective, to make this journal a framework for debate and academic research undertaken by personalities of legal science and reputed legal practitioners. We will also try to connect this publication to the big European and worldwide circuit of ideas and contemporary legal culture.

        The journal aims to include within its structure parts regarding studies of Public and private law, Comparative law, European Law,  Jurisprudence, Critical legal, New legal acts, from the history of great universities, Symposia and Congresses.

         Due to the collaboration of distinguished personalities from the field of research and legal practice in the country and abroad we also want to ensure that more demanding and rigorous studies will be published.
           "Acta Universitatis George Bacovia. Juridica” also proposes itself to initiate and enhance the scientific exchanges with other specialized publications in the country and abroad, and to be included in specialized catalogs, centralized by domains.
         Finally, our desire is to include our journal, “Acta Universitatis George Bacovia. Juridica”, in the international databases.

Individuals interested in publishing in the journal should see the 'Instructions to authors' and 'Submissions and the reviewing process'.

CALL FOR PROPOSALS: Women’s Access to Justice in Plural Legal Systems

 CALL FOR PROPOSALS

National Component of a Regional Research on Women’s Access to Justice in Plural Legal Systems in one of the following countries: 

Cambodia, Indonesia, Lao PDR, Philippines, Thailand, Timor Leste and Vietnam

The UN Entity for Gender Equality and Empowerment ofWomen (UN Women) is calling for proposals to conduct national component of a regional research project on women’s access to justice in plural legal systems in Southeast Asia, namely Cambodia, Indonesia, Lao PDR, Philippines, Thailand, Timor Leste and Vietnam.

In all societies in the region, laws and justice systems are not adequately working for women. Where justice systems reflect existing power imbalances that favor men’s privilege, women’s rights are less protected. Plural legal systems present challenges to women’s access to justice because they often include strands of law that are based on custom, religion and traditional rules and values that restrict women’s rights. When these traditional rules are incorporated into state and non‐state legal and justice systems (such as village courts) women’s rights in the private and domestic sphere, including their rights to live free from violence and make decisions about their sexuality, marriage, divorce and reproductive health, can be limited. The plural legal systems may also limit women’s economic rights including the right to decent work, inheritance and control of land and other productive resources. These legal systems are sometimes procedurally biased against women. The Progress of World Women Report of UN Women noted that the existence of legal plural system in itself can pose particular challenges to women seeking justice as it may create a complex web of overlapping systems in which women can lose their protection or access to rights. Also there are confusions over jurisdictional boundaries, and under-resourced justice systems present barriers to justice for women, especially for those from excluded groups. The challenges for reform of state-recognized and non state legal systems are enormous as they are linked to the complex problems, require state approval and also closely linked with the identity politics.

CALL FOR PAPERS: Workshop on International and Comparative Law

Call For Papers
Third Annual Workshop on International and Comparative Law
Washington University in St Louis, Missouri, USA
1-2 March 2013

The Center on Law, Innovation and Economic Growth (CLIEG) of Washington University in St. Louis will organize the Third Annual Workshop on International and Comparative Law on March, 1-2, 2013. JSD/SJD candidates, PhD students, research fellows, postdocs and visiting assistant professors are invited to present original research papers on international or comparative law, broadly defined. Participation (including meals) is free, but participants should finance their own travel and hotel costs.

PAPER SUBMISSION PROCEDURE: To apply, send a paper or abstract to Gerrit De Geest (degeest@wustl.edu) no later than December 31, 2012. Please indicate academic affiliation and attach a short CV. Submissions are accepted on a rolling basis, and early submissions have a higher acceptance chance. For questions, please contact Michael Peil at mpeil@wulaw.wustl.edu, phone: (314) 935-3346.

JOURNAL: European Constitutional Law Review (EuConst)

The latest European Constitutional Law Review (EuConst) has been published.

The journal is:

a peer reviewed English language journal, is a platform for advancing the study of European constitutional law, its history and evolution. Its scope is European law and constitutional law, history and theory, comparative law and jurisprudence. Published triannually, it contains articles on doctrine, scholarship and history, plus jurisprudence and book reviews.... EuConst is addressed at academics, professionals, politicians and others involved or interested in the European constitutional process. Its Editorial Advisory Board is composed of eminent members in the field of constitutional studies from across the Continent in its new EU format.

PUBLICATION: Ginsburg and Dixon on Comparative Constitutional Law

Elgar Publishing has announced the publication of Tom Ginsburg and Rosalind Dixon (eds), Comparative constitutional law (2012), part of their Research Handbooks in Comparative Law Series:

This landmark volume of specially commissioned, original contributions by top international scholars organizes the issues and controversies of the rich and rapidly maturing field of comparative constitutional law.

Divided into sections on constitutional design and redesign, identity, structure, individual rights and state duties, courts and constitutional interpretation, this comprehensive volume covers dozens of countries as well as a range of approaches to the boundaries of constitutional law. While some chapters reference the text of legal instruments expressly labeled constitutional, others focus on the idea of entrenchment or take a more functional approach.

Challenging the current boundaries of the field, the contributors offer diverse perspectives – cultural, historical and institutional – as well as suggestions for future research. A unique and enlightening volume, Comparative Constitutional Law is an essential resource for students and scholars of the subject.

PUBLICATION: Bogdan on Comparative Law

Europa Law Publishing has announced the publication--in early January 2013-- of Michael Bogdan's Concise introduction to comparative law (2013).

In today's globalized world, jurists cannot limit themselves to studying the laws of their own country. This book is mainly intended to be used as a textbook for beginners taking introductory courses on foreign and comparative law. Its concise format makes it fit for use also in other courses, such as legal history or jurisprudence, having the ambition to provide the students with a basic knowledge about English, American, French, German, Chinese and Islamic law and legal culture, as well as about the methodological problems that arise in connection with studying, comparing and working with foreign legal systems in general. The book will hopefully also be useful as a spring-board towards more profound studies by students and others seeking more advanced knowledge.

Bogdan is Professor of Comparative and Private International Law at the University of Lund, Sweden.

CALL FOR PAPERS (Due 17 December 2012): Crossroads East and West: Visions of the Economy in the Islamic and Western Legal Traditions

Call for Papers

Crossroads East and West: 

Visions of the Economy in the Islamic and Western Legal Traditions

International Workshop

(co-organised with Juris Diversitas)

 Turin, International University College

4-5 February 2013

As the world enters a post-global phase featuring a growing multipolarity of economic and political systems (e.g. with the BRICS countries, as well as economic, demographic and financial powers such as Turkey, Persian Gulf countries, Indonesia and others emerging as significant regional and international players), this multipolarity is, in the 21st century, redefining the global model that emerged at the end of the 20th, one which was clearly dominated by the economic and legal models of Western origin.

Muslim countries, and countries with significant Muslim populations, will, in all their diversity and complexity, be major actors in this polycentric environment, interacting with the West as well as with the geo-political realities of the East, producing new legal developments both regionally and on a global scale.

The international workshop will therefore be devoted to the emerging trends and dynamics in the economies and economic relations and legal interplay within and between Muslim legal systems, traditions and developments, on the one side; and the West, with its legal traditions and the Western-influenced global legal order, on the other.

Divergences and convergences should emerge from the workshop, permitting a better assessment of current developments and of some future legal features of economies and economic relationships in a possible multi-polar world.

The macro-theme of the event will therefore be the economy in its largest sense, with a view to developing legal comparative analyses of economic phenomena in the Islamic and Muslim traditions; perspectives should include both common law and civil law, for the West, and both Shi'a and Sunni approaches, for the East.

NOTICE: The Civil Law Initiative (La Fondation pour le Droit Continental)

I'm reminded that the Fondation pour le Droit Continental/Civil Law Initiative co-organised a Convention of Mediterranean Jurists in Algiers for yesterday and today. The theme was 'legal certainty' and the conference was in both French and English. 

My apologies for not noting this earlier.

The Initiative 'was created to bolster the influence of continental law and contribute to ensuring striking a global legal balance.' Its objectives include:

• To promote the benefits of written and codified laws on the international stage in order to strike a balance between the diverse legal systems, based on innovative, high-quality research, as well as on a wide-reaching policy of dissemination.
•  To generate a sense of solidarity among civil-law legal professionals as a means of orchestrating joint efforts to promote this legal system.
• To implement a legal influence strategy at the international level in the interests of civil-law companies.
• To enhance the expertise of legal professionals on a global scale.
• To reinforce and develop the international presence of the continental law stakeholders.
• To contribute, through training, to the worldwide expansion of civil-law legal professionals.

This 'mixed jurist' heartily approves.

CALL FOR PAPERS: Cambridge Journal of International and Comparative Law Conference

CALL FOR PAPERS

 

Legal Tradition in a Diverse World
Second Cambridge Journal of International

and Comparative Law Conference

18-19 May 2013

The conference will:

explore how legal tradition influences lawyers and the law, in both international and domestic contexts. Law does not develop in a vacuum; it is shaped by the intellectual, cultural and linguistic backgrounds of those who create and administer it. In a world where legal systems increasingly interact, the enduring power of legal tradition necessitates a constant recalibration of theoretical and practical tools to deal with diversity.

To submit a paper proposal:

please email your file, together with a brief biography or CV, to conference@cjicl.org.uk. Conference abstracts must be no longer than 300 words. The deadline for submission is 15 January 2013 - successful applicants will be notified by 1 February.

PUBLICATION: Broekman and Backer on Lawyers Making Meaning

Springer has announced the publication of Jan M Broekman and Larry Catá Backer,  Lawyers Making Meaning:  The Semiotics of Law and Legal Education II (2012):

This book present a structure for understanding and exploring the semiotic character of law and law systems. Cultivating a deep understanding for the ways in which lawyers make meaning—the way in which they help make the world and are made, in turn by the world they create —can provide a basis for consciously engaging in the work of the law and in the production of meaning. The book first introduces the reader to the idea of semiotics in general and legal semiotics in particular, as well as to the major actors and shapers of the field, and to the heart of the matter: signs. The second part studies the development of the strains of thinking that together now define semiotics, with attention being paid to the pragmatics, psychology and language of legal semiotics. A third part examines the link between legal theory and semiotics, the practice of law, the critical legal studies movement in the USA, the semiotics of politics and structuralism. The last part of the book ties the different strands of legal semiotics together, and closely looks at semiotics in the lawyer’s toolkit—such as: text, name and meaning. 

Readers might also want to see Backer's Law at the End of the Day Blog.