Conflicts of Worldviews and Private International Law
Description
This book connects European private international law with decolonial theory.
Decolonial theory calls for alternative modes of producing legal knowledge – ones that give greater weight to the worldviews of formerly colonised peoples across the globe, including in Europe. At the same time, private international law has been described as a particularly suitable field for welcoming more otherness (altérité) in European law. This book therefore develops a decolonial theory of European private international law. To do so, it begins with Western court cases involving what the author terms a 'conflict of worldviews': a clash between the legal frameworks governing the dispute and the worldviews of the formerly colonised parties involved, referred to here as 'postcolonised worldviews'. Through three case studies – respectively addressing religious arbitration, Indigenous sacred land, and faith-based politics – the book demonstrates that courts routinely overlook these conflicts. As a result, the claims of formerly colonised parties are inadequately addressed. To remedy this structural discrimination within European private international law, the book proposes a pluralised theory of choice of court, foreign law, and international jurisdiction, more inclusive of the postcolonised worldviews present in the case studies.
This is an important work, thought-provoking and challenging, which should be read by private international law and comparative law scholars, and more generally by legal and non-legal scholars interested in legal theory and decoloniality.
Accessibility Information
Additional accessibility information
- Conforms with the requirements of EPUB Accessibility Spec v1.1
- WCAG level AA
- WCAG v2.2 compliant
- Accessibility request contact
Support for non-visual reading
- No accessibility features offered by the reading system, device or reading software are disabled or otherwise unusable with the product
- Has alternative text descriptions for images
Visual adjustments
Appearance of the text and page layout can be modified (font, spacing, colors)
Navigation
- Page list to go to pages from the print source version
- Elements such as headings, tables, etc for structured navigation
- All or substantially all textual matter is arranged in a single logical reading order
- Content is enhanced with ARIA roles to optimize organization and facilitate navigation
- Purposes of all links are made clear
Rich content
Language tagging provided
Table of Contents
1. Setting the Scene: Conflicts of Worldviews, Private International Law, Decoloniality, and a Decentring Methodology
Part 1: Conflicts of Worldviews Before Western Courts: Case Studies
2. Jivraj v Hashwani: Religious Arbitration
3. Ktunaxa v British Columbia: Indigenous Sacred Land
4. SMUG v Lively: Sexual Minorities in the Global South
Part 2: Learning from the Case Studies: A Plural PIL Framework in Europe
5. For a Plural Theory of Choice of Court
6. For a Plural Theory of Foreign Law
7. For a Plural Theory of International Jurisdiction
Conclusion: Elements of Decolonial Private International Law in Europe
Product details
| Published | 17 Sep 2026 |
|---|---|
| Format | Ebook (Epub & Mobi) |
| Edition | 1st |
| Pages | 416 |
| ISBN | 9781509978540 |
| Imprint | Hart Publishing |
| Series | Hart Monographs in Transnational and International Law |
| Publisher | Bloomsbury Publishing |
