As of this week, the TPL blog will start publishing a series of blog posts around the theme “Social Justice, Private Law and Europe(?) 2024-2044: Keeping the Hope Alive”, which will be at the centre of a workshop at the University of Amsterdam on 24-25 October 2024.
In 2004, a group of legal scholars from Austria, Finland, France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands and the United Kingdom released a Manifesto for Social Justice in European Contract Law. The Manifesto was ground-breaking at the time. It has been widely credited and cited, and it is fair to say that it established the idea of a more explicitly progressive transnational discourse in European private law academia. A decade later, in the midst of the sovereign debt crisis, an effort to actualise the Manifesto stumbled upon understandable perplexity: in the words of a friend of the project, “When the very access to the market place is foreclosed by indigence and marginalization, the promise of contracts that would be sweet toward the vulnerable has the flavor of Marie Antoinette’s brioche” (Caruso 2013). Since then, a number of momentous global developments have taken place – not only and not chiefly within private law as such, bringing along new manifestos with different focuses and ambitions (see Fabre Magnan 2017, IGLP Law and Global Production working group 2016, Grewal, Kapczynski, and Britton-Purdy 2017). What now?
Faced with intersectional oppression and marginalisation, (post-)colonial exploitation, democratic degradation, the ecological crisis deepening worldwide, and the opacity of “disruptive” technologies, one may be tempted, as Caruso, to disqualify private law’s relevance; at the other extreme, one may think that private law is so intrinsically problematic that the only possible lesson from the past decades – including Katharina Pistor’s founding contribution in The Code of Capital – is that private law institutions are, in the long term, incompatible with an even minimally just society and sustainable life on the planet.
Hence the most pressing question to ask in 2024, as we celebrate the 20th anniversary of the Manifesto, seems to be one of great relevance to the TPL blog: can private law be “rescued”, or even serve as catalyst for the changes necessary towards sustainable societies? What can make it a viable idea in 2044, 2084 and counting? Can a more radical reflection on “social justice” that the Manifesto itself invoked be the driving force for making private law a compelling framework? Using the 2004 Manifesto as a starting point offers the additional advantage of carving out a distinct territorial perspective, so often missing in private law theory: what kind of role does Europe play in a viable private law in 20 years and more? While Euro-nationalist efforts to create a European civil code have been abandoned, the Union is more active than ever in a number of fields: accelerating large-scale phenomena as “sustainability” and “digitisation” have created a seeming consensus legal basis. Unlike 20 years ago, political disagreements are now concerned with content rather than competence. Yet, with nationalism on the rise and Majority World’s preoccupations with the colonial b-sides of the Brussels effect – as well as prevailing unwillingness to face the task of decolonising the EU at home – the political and normative basis of such consensus seem extremely fragile.
The organisers invited early-stage and more established scholars to gather in Amsterdam to share thoughts on Social Justice, Private Law and Europe in 2044. We will convene to discuss brief statements and initial ideas that will lay the groundwork for a Manifesto for the 21st century. These initial ideas will be captured in the blogposts that are about to start appearing on the blog. We will publish these posts as much as possible between now and the workshop, which means that unlike our usual posts these submissions will only be subject to marginal (language) review and editing. After the workshop, there will be further action not to be missed – as the “short manifesto” drafted by participants will be submitted to rounds of input, criticism and further interaction. Stay tuned for the coming stages of this highly energizing project!
Candida Leone, conference co-convenor and TPL editor
Carolina Paulesu, Tommaso Fia, Martijn Hesselink (co-convenors)
Art by Tomoko Nagao
Il quarto stato with motta, campari, firelli, armani, prada, chicco, alitalia and visa at piazza duomo
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