Adapting Legal Cultures

David Nelken is Professor of Law at the University of Macerata in Italy. Johannes Feest is Professor of Law at the University of Bremen.

...brings to the forefront critical debates that demand attention in any serious comparative endeavour. Fiona Haines, University of Melbourne The Australian and New Zealand Journal of Criminology, Vol. 38, No. 1 2005 The collection of essays by Nelken and Feest makes an important contribution to both comparative law and legal sociology particularly because it does not confine itself to the classical legal systems which many comparative lawyers (like myself) have studied, and because it endeavours to create a dialogue between comparative lawyers and legal sociologists in terms of both theory and the analysis of particular legal developments. A combination of the two fields of legal scholarship presents a significant dimension to contemporary comparative law, and this collection will be a major point of reference in both fields. In the end, this book marks an important step in developing an agenda for comparative law in our contemporary world. John Bell International and Comparative Law Quarterly February 2002 The chapters in this volume offer a range of valuable insights Book Review Editor Tilburg Foreign Law Review April 2003

• Part 1 Theorizing legal adaptation: towards a sociology of legal adaptation, David Nelken; what "legal transplants"?, Pierre Legrand; is there a logic of legal transplants?, Roger Cotterrell; some comments on Cotterrell and legal transplants, Lawrence Friedman; state formation and legal change - on the impact of international politics, Alex Jettinghoff; from globalization of law to law under globalization, Wolf Heydebrand. Part 2 Case studies of legal adaptation: the still-birth and re-birth or product liability in Japan, Luke Nottage; the empty space of the modern in Japanese law discourse, Takao Tanase; comparative law and legal transplantation in South East Asia, Andrew Harding; marketization, public service and universal service, Tony Prosser; the import and export of law and legal institutions - international strategies in national palace wars, Yves Dezalay and Bryant Garth; the vultures fly east - the creation and globalization of the distressed debt market, John Flood.