EJIL:Talk! Discussion of Dunoff & Trachtman “Ruling the World? Constitutionalism, International Law and Global Governmance”

Over the next couple of weeks, EJIL:Talk! will host a discussion of a recent book edited by Jeffrey Dunoff and Joel Trachman – Ruling the World? Constitutionalism, International Law and Global Governance (Cambridge, 2009). This is a major work by leading scholars which examines constitutionalism and constitutional discourse in a range of areas of international law. According to the book’s publishers (Cambridge University Press):

Ruling the World?: Constitutionalism, International Law, and Global Governance provides an interdisciplinary analysis of the major developments and central questions in debates over international constitutionalism at the UN, EU, WTO, and other sites of global governance. The essays in this volume explore controversial empirical and structural questions, doctrinal and normative issues, and questions of institutional design and positive political theory. Ruling the World? grows out of a three-year research project that brought twelve leading scholars together to create a comprehensive and integrated framework for understanding global constitutionalization. Ruling the World? is the first volume to explore in a cross-cutting way constitutional discourse across international regimes, constitutional pluralism, and relations among transnational and domestic constitutions. The volume examines the core assumptions, basic analytic tools, and key challenges in contemporary debates over international constitutionalization.

Contributors to the EJIL:Talk! discussion will include Jeff Dunoff (Temple University), Joel Trachtman (Fletcher School of Law & Diplomacy), Andreas Paulus (Gottingen), Mattias Kumm (New York University/Harvard) and Neil Walker (Edinburgh Law School), all of whom are contributors to the book. Commentators on the book will include: Robert Howse (New York University), Gráinne de Búrca (Fordham/NYU), Nico Krisch (Hertie School of Governance, Berlin) and David Schneiderman (University of Toronto).

As always readers, are encouraged to join the discussion using the comments feature on the blog. For those who don’t yet have the book, you can find excerpts at the CUP site (see here) and on SSRN (see here).

The table of contents of the book is as follows:

Part I. What Is Constitutionalism Beyond the State?:

1. A functional approach to global constitutionalism Jeffrey L. Dunoff and Joel P. Trachtman; 2. The mystery of global governance David Kennedy; 3. The international legal system as a constitution Andreas Paulus;

Part II. The Constitutional Dimensions of Specific International Regimes: 4. The UN charter – a global constitution? Michael Doyle; 5. Rediscovering a forgotten constitution: notes on the place of the UN charter in the international legal order Bardo Fassbender; 6. Reframing EU constitutionalism Neil Walker; 7. The politics of international constitutions: the curious case of the WTO Jeffrey L. Dunoff; 8. Constitutional economics of the WTO Joel P. Trachtman;

Part III. Cross Cutting Issues: 9. Human rights and international constitutionalism Stephen Gardbaum; 10. The cosmopolitan turn in constitutionalism: on the relationship between national constitutional law and constitutionalism beyond the state Mattias Kumm; 11. Constitutional heterarchy: the centrality of conflict in the United States and Europe Daniel Halberstam; 12. Courts and pluralism: essay on a theory of judicial adjudication in the context of legal and constitutional pluralism Miguel Poiares Maduro; 13. Whose constitution(s)? International law, constitutionalism and democracy Samantha Besson.