Welcome to the Max Planck Institute for Legal History and Legal Theory

Welcome to the Max Planck Institute for Legal History and Legal Theory

We provide a forum for reflecting on law.
We explore its theory and history in a comparative and global perspective.
We address societal challenges by contributing to a deeper understanding of law.
Multidisciplinary Theory of Law
Department Marietta Auer
Historical Regimes of Normativity
Department Thomas Duve
European and Comparative Legal History
Department Stefan Vogenauer

News

Unveiling Historical Bonds
In his recent blog article ‚Migration and trade: two sides of the same coin?‘, Thomas Duve delves into the historical intertwining of migration and trade, drawing on the insights of the School of Salamanca and its significant figures like Domingo de Soto. He shows how theologians and philosophers of the time advocated for the free movement of goods and people based on the ius gentium.
Legal history meets carnival in Rio
Legal history and the Rio carnival might seem worlds apart. Yet, this year the Portela Samba school seamlessly wove Rio's long-silenced slavery legacy together with the story of 19th-century lawyer Luiz Gama, whose work freeing hundreds of enslaved people is now being appreciated thanks to the research of our scholar Bruno Lima.
Bridging Nations

Bridging Nations

February 23, 2024
Parliamentary democracy has long been cited as one of the key legal inheritances of the British Empire in its former colonies, but this can obscure our view of the cross-fertilisation of ideas of law, democracy and sovereignty between different British colonies. In this interview, Martin O’Donoghue explains why comparing a small island nation to a subcontinent will yield important insights.

The line that never was: local knowledge and the demarcation of a colonial border

Mar 19, 2024 01:00 PM - 02:00 PM (Local Time Germany)
mpilhlt, Turmcarree, Room: A 601

Workshop RISE-mpilhlt: Direitos e resistências nos Mundos Ibéricos

Mar 21, 2024 03:00 PM - 05:00 PM (Local Time Germany)
mpilhlt, Room: Z01

Normative repertoires in long-term developments of labour relations

Apr 9, 2024 02:00 PM - 04:00 PM (Local Time Germany)
mpilht, Room: Turmcarrée
A basic bibliography on the history of Ibero-America and the Spanish Caribbean in the colonial period
Rechtsvergleichung als Erkenntnismethode. Historische Perspektiven vom Spätmittelalter bis ins 19. Jahrhundert
Cover Rechtsgeschichte – Legal History 30 (2022)
Emanzipation und Recht. Zur Geschichte der Rechtswissenschaft und der jüdischen Gleichberechtigung
Open Access
Edited by Karl Härter, Tina Hannappel and Conrad TyrichterStudien zu Policey, Kriminalitätsgeschichte und Konfliktregulierung
Celebrar lo imposible. El Código Civil en el régimen jurídico de la propiedad: Córdoba entre fines del siglo XIX y comienzos del XX
„recht erzählen“. Regionale Studien 1650–1850
Norms beyond Empire: Law-Making and Local Normativities in Iberian Asia, 1500-1800
Staatsangehörigkeit und Rassismus. Rechtsdiskurse und Verwaltungspraxis in den Kolonien Eritrea und Deutsch-Ostafrika (1882–1919)
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