The Rule of Laws PB

A fascinating, comprehensive study that forces us to think again about what law is, and why it matters ... For those who want to understand why human society has emerged as it has, this is essential reading Rana Mitter, author of Chinas Good War The laws now enforced throughout the world are almost all modelled on systems developed in Europe in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. During two hundred years of colonial rule, Europeans exported their laws everywhere they could. But they werent filling a void: in many places, they displaced traditions that were already ancient when Vasco Da Gama first arrived in India. Where, then, did it all begin? And what has law been and done over the course of human history? In The Rule of Laws, pioneering anthropologist Fernanda Pirie traces the development of the worlds great legal systems - Chinese, Indian, Roman, and Islamic - and the innumerable smaller traditions they inspired.