Just Published: "The Problem of the Enterprise and the Enterprise of Law: Multinational Enterprises as Polycentric Transnational Regulatory Space" in the The Oxford Handbook of Transnational Law (Peer Zumbansen, ed.)

I am happy to report that the The Oxford Handbook of Transnational Law (Peer Zumbansen, ed.) is available for pre-orders and will ship on 30 April 2021. The publisher describes the book this way:

The Oxford Handbook of Transnational Law offers a unique and unparalleled treatment and presentation in the field of Transnational Law that has become one of the most intriguing and innovative developments in legal doctrine, scholarship, theory, and practice today. This in itself constitutes an ambitious editorial project, not only within law and legal doctrine, but also with regard to an increasing interest in an interdisciplinary engagement of law with social sciences - including sociology, anthropology, political science, geography, and political theory. Closely tied into the substantive transformation that many legal fields are undergoing is the observation that many of these developments are driven by changes in an increasingly global legal practice today. The concept then, of 'transnational law' aims at capturing the distinctly border- crossing nature even of those legal fields which had for the longest been time been seen as having merely 'domestic' relevance. This shift also requires a conscious effort among law school classroom instructors, casebook authors, and curriculum reformers to adapt their teaching content to these circumstances. As the authors of this Handbook make clear, this adaptation requires a close dialogue between a scholarly investigation into the transnational 'concept of law' and the challenges faced by practicing lawyers, be that as solicitor, in-house counsel, as judges, or as bureaucrats in a globalized regulatory and socio-economic environment. While the main thrust is on the transnationalization of legal doctrine and legal theory, with a considerable contribution from and engagement with social sciences, the Handbook features numerous reflections on the relationship between transnational law and legal practice.

The 53 articles that comprise this work are well worth reading and will serve as a very useful resource for those interested in the field and its many byways, tributaries, and meanders. Great thanks to Peer Zumbansen (now at McGill)) without whose vision and organizational ability this would not have been possible.

My own contribution, The Problem of the Enterprise and the Enterprise of Law: Multinational Enterprises as Polycentric Transnational Regulatory Space, explores the emerging complexities of polycentric regulatory space represented by the convenient construct--the multinational or transnational enterprise. To that effect it examines first the relationship between emerging transnational law and an objectified MNE. It then considers the way that the focus and context of transnational law shifts as the regulatory focus moves from MNE as object to the MNE as a set of linkages and connections, and then to the regulation of production through which is itself the object of MNE function. This reconsideration of the character of the MNE produces a substantial effect on the way in which transnational law is understood and applied, matching polycentricity in the construction of law with polycentricity in the construction of the MNE itself.

The pre-publication version of the chapter may be accessed HERE.

The table of contents of the Handbook is reproduced below. 

Table of Contents

Preface
Acknowledgements

I. Foundations

1. Transnational Law: Theories & Applications
Peer Zumbansen
2. Normative and Legal Pluralism: A Global Perspective
William Twining
3. Transnational Law and Economic Sociology
Sabine Frerichs
4. Out of Sight: Transnational Legal Cultures
Helge Dedek
5. The Post-Modern Normative Anxiety of Transnational Legal Studies
Giulia Leonelli

II. Fields

6. Transnational Constitutionalism
Christopher Thornhill
7. Transnational Administrative Law
Karl-Heinz Ladeur
8. Transnational Criminal Law
Prabha Kotiswaran & Nicola Palmer
9. Transnational Health Law
Aziza Ahmed
10. Recognizing Transnational Refugee Law
Satvinder Juss
11. Transnational Climate Law
Natasha Affolder
12. Transnational Food Law
Matthew Canfield
13. International Investment Law as Transnational Law
Nicolás Perrone
14. Transnational Antitrust Law
Hannah L. Buxbaum
15. Transnational Mining Law
Sara Seck
16. The Standardization of Oil and Gas Law: Transnational Layers of Governance
Djakhongir Saidov
17. Law & Development
Amanda Perry-Kessaris
18. Transnational Space Law
Kevin Madders
19. Transnational Internet Law
Chris Marsden
20. Transnational Commercial Law
Shahla Ali
21. Transnational Arbitration Law
Florian Grisel
22. Transnational Law and Conflict of Laws: A Japanese Perspective
Dai Yokomizo
23. Transnational Sports Law
Antoine Duval
24. Transnational Contract Law
Klaas Hendrik Eller
25. Transnational Property Law
Priya S. Gupta
26. Transnational Tort Law
Cees van Dam
27. Transnational Family Law
Claire Fenton-Glynn
28. Architects, Landscapers and Gardeners in the Transnational Futures of International Labour Law
Adelle Blackett
29. Transnational Corporate Governance
Dionysia Katelouzou & Peer Zumbansen
30. Transnational Art Law - Maps and Itineraries
Vik Kanwar & Jaya Neupaney

III. Legitimacy and Politics of Transnational Regulatory Governance

31. Transnational Migration Law: Authority, Contestation, Decolonization
Sara Dehm
32. Contextualization as a (Feminist) Method for Transnational Legal Practice
Farnush Ghadery
33. Queering the Transnational: Law and Sexuality
Dipika Jain
34. The Social Question in a Transnational Context
Alexander Somek
35. The Problem of the Enterprise and the Enterprise of Law: Multinational Enterprises as Polycentric Transnational Regulatory Space
Larry Catá Backer
36. Reclaiming Sovereignty: Resistance to Transnational Authority and the Investor-State Regime
A. Claire Cutler
37. Transnational Sustainability Governance and the Law
Phillip Paiement
38. Terrorism and Transnational Law: Rules of Law Under Conditions of Globalization
Cian C. Murphy
39. Democracy and Human Rights Adjudication in the Inter-American Legal Space
Rene Urueña
40. The Global Governance Implications of Private International Law
Horatia Muir Watt
41. Stakes of the Right to Food in the Politics of Transnational Law
Naoyuki Okano
42. Climate Change Governance, International Relations and Politics: A Transnational Law Perspective
Stephen Minas
43. Global Social Indicators and their Legitimacy in Transnational Law
Mathias Siems & David Nelken

IV. Methodologies: Challenges and Approaches

44. Transnational Law and Legal Positivism
Michael Giudice & Eric Scarffe
45. With, Within, and Beyond the State: The Promise and Limits of Transnational Legal Ordering
Gregory Shaffer & Terence Halliday
46. Transnational Law and Feminist Legal Theory
Ratna Kapur
47 Transnational Law and the Ethnography of Corporate Social Responsibility
Laura Knöpfel
48. Transnational Law and Literatures: A Postcolonial Perspective
Amanda Lagji
49. Representing Transnational Law: Drone Warfare and Transnational Legal Text
Jothie Rajah

V. The Transnational Legal Profession and Legal Education

50. Beyond Borders and Across Legal Traditions: The Transnationalization of Latin American Lawyers
Manuel A. Gómez
51. 'Africa Needs Many Lawyers Trained for the Need of their Peoples'
Struggles over Legal Education in Kwame Nkrumah's Ghana
John Harrington & Ambreena Manji
52. Transnational Legal Education in China
Stephen Minas
53. Transnational Legal Education
Eve Darian-Smith