A Global History Of Ideas In The Language Of Law

The book is based on the observation that the study of the global history of ideas is currently dominated by historians, philosophers and political theorists. Scholars of law play almost no role in this context. This neglect of the perspectives of legal history and legal sociology conflicts with the easily established finding that many central concepts of the history of political ideas are at the same time legal concepts, such as natural law, human rights, constitution, and the rule of law. Moreover, many key figures in the history of ideas engaged deeply with the world of law and some – such as Kant, Hegel, and Weber – published their own philosophy or sociology of law. From this point of departure, the book explores the global history of ideas by asking to what extent the history of political ideas can also be told in the language of law. The result, unsurprisingly, is that a global history of political ideas not only can but should be written in the language of law. This book wants to make a small contribution to that end.