SOCIETÀ ITALIANA DI DIRITTO ED ECONOMIA
CALL FOR PAPERS
COMPARATIVE LAW IN THE AGE OF DISORDER
IL DIRITTO COMPARATO NELL’EPOCA DEL DISORDINE
XXVIII BIENNIAL COLLOQUIUM OF THE ITALIAN ASSOCIATION OF COMPARATIVE LAW (AIDC)
PALERMO, 29-31 MAY 2025
DEADLINE MARCH 5, 2025
Submission on-line form:
We live in a time of disorder. Serious challenges are undermining the traditional balances underpinned by national and supranational legal orders. Some of these challenges relate to the relationship between human beings and nature (ecological crises, natural disasters, increasing water scarcity, etc.), others to the relationship between human beings and their political institutions (fragmentation of traditional social structures, ageing, gender imbalances, breakdown of international organisations, geopolitical tensions, rise of authoritarianism). All of this is a source of complexity for law, both in the sense that legal institutions need to be adapted to keep pace with the ongoing transformations (from the level of legal sources to the techniques of adjudication), and in the sense that legal epistemology needs to be rethought in order to effectively interpret a rapidly changing social environment (is legal certainty still a value, are we witnessing a shift towards 'personalised' law, what is the significance of legal subjectivity in the age of AI, etc.?). The 28th Biennial Colloquium of the Italian Association of Comparative Law aims to examine the long-term effects of the current disruptions on the legal dimension and to reflect on the possible contributions of legal comparison to this debate.
The following is a list of possible questions for which the call for papers is open:
I. Geopolitical Disorder
1) The crisis of the international order
2) The decline of the West and the rise of the rest?
3) Wars, War Crimes and the Role of the UN
4) Autonomous weapons and the rule of law
5) Private actors and new dimensions of sovereignty
6) Energy transitions and the new geopolitics of power
7) The race for spaces (outer space, oceans, etc.)
8) The regulation of cyberspace
II. Ecological Disorder
1) Natural Disasters and the Law
2) Climate change litigation
3) Access to Water and Social Conflicts
4) Digital transformation and environmental sustainability
5) Aporias of green development
III. Epistemological Disorder
1) Traditional law and personalised law
2) Are legal taxonomies still reliable?
3) The shifting boundaries between the public and the private
4) Economic efficiency as a legal value?
5) Interdisciplinarity: should we still "think like a lawyer"?
IV. Relational disorder
1) The new legal subjects (autonomous agents, nature, animals)
2) Ageing and the law
3) Fragmentation of family structures (famigration and beyond)
4) Immigration and fundamental rights
5) Old and new slaveries
6) Gender and identity
I. TO WHOM THE CALL FOR PAPERS IS ADDRESSED
AIDC organizes on a biennial basis a “younger comparatists colloquium” (the last one, in 2024, was held in Rome) open to PhD candidates and holders, lecturers, adjunct professors; and the ordinary biennial colloquium (the present is the 28th), generally open to full and associate professors. Therefore, the selection committee will prefer papers presented by full and associate professors, although it may make a limited number of exceptions. Papers should be in Italian or English and may be presented in either language. Simultaneous translation will not be provided.
II. ORGANIZATIONAL ASPECTS
The proposals must be submitted by e-mail by March 5, 2025 indicating the general topic on which they wish to present their paper. Acceptance will be communicated by the end of March. Within 10 days from acceptance, the participation fee (€ 80) must be paid. If not, acceptance will be forfeited, and the selection committee will move on to other candidates. This requirement is essential to avoid that no-show of some participants precludes the possibility to others to present their papers. The Colloquium will be organized in plenary opening (Thursday, May 29) and closing (Saturday, May 31) sessions (with invited speakers) and parallel sessions (Friday, May 30 and Saturday, May 31) divided according to topics. It is expected that up to 40 papers will be presented in a time slot not exceeding 15 minutes per speaker, followed by a Q&A session.
III. OTHER ASPECTS
The XXVIII biennial Colloquium is co-organized with the University of Palermo, Department of Political Science and International Relations DEMS and the Center of Advanced Studies.
IV. HOW TO SUBMIT A PROPOSAL
Abstracts should be submitted in a Pdf format, by completing this on-line form
following this order:
a) author(s)
b) affiliation
c) e-mail address
d) title of abstract
e) body of abstract (max 250 words)
Abstract file should be entitled: Family Name_Last Name.pdf
V. PROCEEDINGS
The proceedings of the Colloquium will be published. Authors may also publish their paper on other periodicals, in particular on the on-line periodical “Comparative Law Review”, sponsored by AIDC, will devote a special issue to the proceedings of the Colloquium. Papers (in Italian and in English) may also be submitted for publication to “Diritto pubblico comparato ed europeo”, to “Comparazione e diritto civile” and to the “Cardozo Electronic Law Bulletin”, which are among the leading Italian comparative law reviews.
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