Comparative Law in a Global Context - The Legal Systems of Asia and Africa

This book presents a critical rethinking of the study of comparative law and legal theory in a globalising world and proposes a new model. It highlights the inadequacies of currentWestern theoretical approaches in comparative law, international law, legal theory and jurisprudence, especially for studying Asian and African laws, arguing that they are too parochial and eurocentric to meet global challenges. Menski argues for combining modern natural law theories with positivist and socio-legal traditions, building an interactive, triangular concept of legal pluralism. Advocated as the fourth major approach to legal theory, this model is applied in analysing the historical and conceptual development of Hindu law, Muslim law, African laws and Chinese law. Werner Menski is Professor of South Asian Laws at the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London, where he is also Chair of the Centre for Ethnic Minority Studies. He has published widely in the area of South Asian Law. He has been a Visiting Professor at the Pakistan College of Law, Lahore, the South Asia Institute, University of Heidelberg, the Tokyo University of Foreign Studies, and at ILS Law College, Pune, India.