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Resisting Legal Convergence

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Are Legal Systems Converging or Diverging?

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Abstract

In 1996, Pierre Legrand wrote an article hypothesising that European legal systems are not converging based factors that create difficulties in changing ingrained legal cultural characteristics. These path dependent characteristics are unique to individual legal systems and influence the fundamental legal principles and concepts that underpin the aims and purposes of the law on the books. Whereas there are certainly similarities in the result of applying similar laws in different jurisdictions, these results are often achieved in different ways. There are also political and cultural perspectives that change in waves over time that will influence the willingness of an electorate to align more closely with other jurisdictions on a global scale. These winds of change create a further and unpredictable influence that creates further obstacles to a sustained convergence over time. Although the world has become ever more global with a connected need to draw legal systems into closer alignment to ensure efficient resolutions to cross-border legal matters since Legrand first introduced his hypothesis, the underlying obstacles to sustained convergence of legal systems remain. This chapter considers whether legal systems are still not converging with potential reasons as to why this may be the case now and continue to be so in the future.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    Gant (2015).

  2. 2.

    Legrand (1996).

  3. 3.

    Professor emeritus of Maastricht University in Comparative Law and Private International Law with books and articles published on nationality law, comparative law, private international law, legal translation and the protection of regional and minority languages.

  4. 4.

    Peter M Laing Professor at the Faculty of Law at McGill University specialized in comparative law, private international law, and civil procedure.

  5. 5.

    Sir Basil Markesinis QC, LLD, DCL, FBA is a Greek-British barrister and legal scholar currently holding the position of Jamail Regents Professor at the University of Texas, Austin.

  6. 6.

    See Zweigert and Kotz (1998).

  7. 7.

    De Groot (1992).

  8. 8.

    Glenn (1993), p. 567.

  9. 9.

    Markensis (1994).

  10. 10.

    Legrand (1996), p. 55.

  11. 11.

    Platsas (2017), p. 245.

  12. 12.

    Zweigert and Kotz (1998), p. 34.

  13. 13.

    Ibid, p. 35.

  14. 14.

    Legrand (1996), p. 56.

  15. 15.

    See Hathaway (2000); Bell (2012).

  16. 16.

    Legrand (1996), p. 56.

  17. 17.

    Ibid.

  18. 18.

    Ibid, p. 58.

  19. 19.

    Posner (2000).

  20. 20.

    Gant (2015), p. 4.

  21. 21.

    Legrand (1996), p. 58.

  22. 22.

    Ibid, p. 60.

  23. 23.

    Ibid.

  24. 24.

    Davies (1997), pp. 1065–1066.

  25. 25.

    Gant (2017), pp. 135–136.

  26. 26.

    Council Recommendation of 19 June 2000 on the broad guidelines of the economic policies of the Member States and the Community, O.J. L 210 (2000).

  27. 27.

    Barnard (2006), pp. 26–27.

  28. 28.

    Gant (2017), p. 136.

  29. 29.

    Craig and de Burca (2015), p. 3.

  30. 30.

    Lynch Fannon et al. (2022), p. 33.

  31. 31.

    Lynch Fannon et al. (2022), p. 251.

  32. 32.

    Ibid.

  33. 33.

    On the concept of legal origins, see for example: Armour et al. (2008, 2009); Ahlering and Deakin (2007).

  34. 34.

    Lynch Fannon et al. (2022), p. 275.

  35. 35.

    Gant (2020), p. 61.

  36. 36.

    Arnorsson and Zoega (2018), p. 303.

  37. 37.

    Ghio et al. (2021), pp. 438–439.

  38. 38.

    European Commission (2006) Cooperation and verification mechanism for Bulgaria and Romania, https://ec.europa.eu/info/policies/justice-and-fundamental-rights/upholding-rule-law/rule-law/assistance-bulgaria-and-romania-under-cvm/cooperation-and-verification-mechanism-bulgaria-and-romania_en.

  39. 39.

    Lynch Fannon et al. (2022), p. 273.

  40. 40.

    Lieberman et al. (2019).

  41. 41.

    Murib (2020), p. 296.

  42. 42.

    Szczerbiak (2022).

  43. 43.

    Ibid.

  44. 44.

    Platsas section 3.3.

  45. 45.

    Marayev and Guz (2022).

  46. 46.

    The War in the Ukraine: Get off the Fence, The Economist 16th-22nd April 2022.

  47. 47.

    Ibid.

  48. 48.

    Craig and de Burca (2015), p. 15.

  49. 49.

    Lynch Fannon et al. (2022), pp. 33–34.

  50. 50.

    See European Commission (2010).

  51. 51.

    Commission Recommendation of 12 March 2014 on a new approach to business failure and insolvency, O.J. L 74 (2014).

  52. 52.

    European Commission, Commission Recommendation of 12 March 2014 on a new approach to business failure and insolvency (Text with EEA relevance) (2014/135/EU), p. 1.

  53. 53.

    Directive (EU) 2019/1023 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 20 June 2019 on preventive restructuring frameworks, on discharge of debt and disqualifications, and on measures to increase the efficiency of procedures concerning restructuring, insolvency and discharge of debt, and amending Directive (EU) 2017/1132 O.J. L 172.

  54. 54.

    Lynch Fannon et al. (2022), p. 194.

  55. 55.

    UNCITRAL Model Law on Cross-Border Insolvency (1997).

  56. 56.

    UNCITRAL Legislative Guide on Insolvency Law (2019).

  57. 57.

    UNCITRAL Legislative Recommendations on Insolvency of Micro- and Small Enterprises (2021).

  58. 58.

    Gant (2014), p. 77.

  59. 59.

    Legrand (1996), p. 61.

  60. 60.

    Platsas section 3.3.

  61. 61.

    Platsas section 3.1.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. University of Derby, College of Business, Law and Social Sciences, Derby, England, UK

    Jennifer L. L. Gant

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Correspondence to Jennifer L. L. Gant .

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  1. University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh, UK

    Emilie Ghio

  2. Fluminense Federal University, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil

    Ricardo Perlingeiro

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Gant, J.L.L. (2024). Resisting Legal Convergence. In: Ghio, E., Perlingeiro, R. (eds) Are Legal Systems Converging or Diverging?. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-38180-5_4

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