empire, law and important boundaries and dates

Title: empire, law and important boundaries and dates

> Dear WSN people:
>
> I have been enjoying the recent exchanges. So I wanted to chip in with
> some comments and questions.
>
> One: I would like to highlight the effort to move the world system
> theories  towards something else, a next phase, dimension, etc.
> (I have in mind Hardt/Negri's Empire, and I apologize if this
> conversation has already taken place). Which might --or might not-- be
> directly related to cultures of scholarship as for example the
> proposal of Open the Social Sciences, also with Wallerstein. The
> movements, mutations, transformations of the matrix of capitalism and
> how this might have an impact on all of us in relation to our
> scholarship, conceptions of history, focus on what kinds of problems,
> etc.
>
> I confess that I do not quite see the associations between what we may
> call "the law" and the supposed de-centering, diffusionist,
> foggy no-clear-center, no-clear-periphery geography described by H
> &N. At least in my reading. Except perhaps the  bankruptcy in
> the articulation of legal principles (division from politics, etc.).
> Which does not mean that they are not operative. Should we wish to
> emphasize convergence:  If law is regulation, and the frame we
> all suffer is national regulation for the  most part, what does
> it mean that we are in a supposedly de-regulated, extremely flexible
> living situation globally? Is this so? Yes, no? The irrelevance of
> officially appointed "law people"? Kafka's The Castle or the
> burocratic society? 
> It
> was really interesting: I got to witness a somewhat high-profile panel
> in a conservative right-wing think tank, and there you could see a
> formerly extremely visible Republican leader talking the tough talk of
> war, tanks, Iraq, etc. side by side a well-respected, also visible
> constitutional lawyer. Clearly you could see and hear on the one hand,
> explicit no-nonsense talk of American domination, and on the other,
> the talk of Constitutional values and rights, and how these may be
> damaged by the current situation and how we "want smart
> government" and euphemisms of this sort, or  implicit
> American domination. These two discourses do not interesect 
> however. These two people do not take too many panels together. But I
> would say the bottom theme is the same. And of course the
> constitutional lawyer had nothing to say when the political
> imagination took all of us to contemplate the world at large. Once you
> step outside your national tradition, wellŠ This is how I see law
> and the supposedly decentered world. The initiative for the
> International Criminal Court of Justice is out there, however. I
> should mention that the shriveled branch of international law in most
> law schools, but also history and philophy of law is a clear symptom
> of this, which is why you have a non-philosophical, non-historical
> take on business-level regulation (i.e. policy) levels and the whole
> point is that there is nothing else. Any suggestions, thoughts,
> comments?
>
> Two: Hardt/Negri try to work within Wallerstein's panoramic work. They
> try to move it further. Bring it to another level. Push the envelope.
> I don't know if they success. They try. I am not aware if W. himself
> has responded to this. It would be great to know (of course a
> delightful possibility if W. himself commented on this). I honestly do
> not think the big picture of historical things gets much improved by
> H/N riding a virtual car in the highway from Roman Empire to
> Washington. And nothing else. Law is incorported here but as little
> more than bankruptcy as before. Any takes on this?
>
> Final thing: Any good sources on Westphalia-1648? If we take this as a
> turning point for influential and long-lasting boundary-creating, any
> good sources on pre- and post-1648?
> Many thanks and keep it alive,