num_pages: 300
description: This book advances a new perspective in world history, arguing that institutions and culture--and not just the global economy--serve as important elements of international order. Focusing on colonial legal politics and the interrelation of local cultural contests and institutional change, it uses case studies to trace a shift in plural legal orders--from the multicentric law of early empires to the state-centered law of the colonial and postcolonial world. Benton shows how Indigenous subjects across time were active in making, changing, and interpreting the law--and, by extension, in shaping the international order.
language: English
title: Law and Colonial Cultures: Legal Regimes in World History, 1400-1900
titlecomplete: Law and Colonial Cultures: Legal Regimes in World History, 1400-1900
genres: Politics, Philosophy, Law, Nonfiction, World History, History
ratings_count: 23
series: Studies in Comparative World History
awards: awardedAt: 1041408000000
name: WHA Bentley Book Prize
publisher: Cambridge University Press