The fact that aspects of witnesses and evidence put them in the centre of the institutional and cultural (e.g. religious, literary) construction of ancient societies indicates that it is important to keep offering nuanced approaches to the topic of this volume. To advance knowledge of the processes of presenting witnesses and gathering, or constructing, evidence is, in fact, to better and more fully understand the ways in which deliberative Athenian democracy functions, what the core elements of political life and civic identity are, and how they relate to the system of using logos to make decisions. For, witnesses and evidence were important prerequisites of getting the Athenian citizenship and exerting the civic/political identity as a member of the community. It is important, therefore, all the matters that relate to information-gathering and decision-making to be examined anew. Emphasis can be placed on a variety of genres to allow scholars recreate the fullest and clearest possible image about the witnessing and evidencing in antiquity. Chapters in this volume include considerations of social, political, literary, and moral theory, alongside studies of the impact of information-gathering and decision-making in oratory and drama, with a steady focus on the application of key ideas and values in social and political justice to issues of pressing ethical concern.

This book investigates whether legal reforms intended to create a market-friendly regulatory business environment have a positive impact on economic and financial outcomes. After conducting a critical review of the legal origins literature, the authors first analyze the evolution of legal rules and regulations during the last decade (2006-2014). For that purpose, the book uses legal/regulatory indicators from the World Bank's Doing Business Project (2015). The findings indicate that countries have actively reformed their legal systems during this period, particularly French civil law countries. A process of convergence in the evolution of legal rules and regulations is observed: countries starting in 2006 in a lower position have improved more than countries with better initial scores. Also, French civil law countries have reformed their legal systems to a larger extent than common law countries and, consequently, have improved more in the majority of the Doing Business indicators used. Second, the authors estimate fixed-effects panel regressions to analyze the relationship between changes in legal rules and regulations and changes in the real economy. The findings point to a lack of systematic effects of legal rules and regulations on economic and financial outcomes. This result stands in contrast to the widespread belief that reforms aiming to strengthen investor and creditor rights (and other market-friendly policies) systematically lead to better economic and financial outcomes.

This book offers a comprehensive investigation of privacy in the modern world. It collects 16 papers that look at this essential topic from many facets, from the personal to the technological, from the philosophical to the legal. The contributors examine such issues as the value of privacy protection, the violation of spreading personal falsehoods, the digital rights of children, an individual's right to be forgotten from internet search engines, and more. The organization of the volume helps provide a nuanced understanding of this often controversial topic. Coverage starts with key concepts before moving on to explore personal information privacy and the impact of new technologies. Next, the papers consider privacy in different contexts. These include work, sex, family, crime, and religion. This structure enables greater engagement with the difficult questions about privacy. Readers will gain deep insight into the core concepts of privacy as well as its application to everyday life. This interdisciplinary volume brings together an international team of scholars. They provide a broad combination of expertise in law, philosophy, and political science. Overall, this thought-provoking examination will appeal to interested readers in both academia and practice.

This book offers a comparative analysis of traditional Asian legal systems. It combines methods from legal history, legal anthropology, legal philosophy, and substantive law, pursuing a comprehensive approach that offers readers a broad perspective on the topic. The geographic regions covered include the Near East, Middle East, Central Asia, India, China, Japan, and Southeast Asia. For each region, the book first provides historical and political context. Next, it discusses major milestones in the region's legal history and political institutions, as well as its forms of government. Readers are then presented with fundamental principles and terms needed to understand the legal arguments discussed. The book begins with the Ancient Near East and important topics such as Jewish law. The next part considers Islamic law, while also exploring modern issues. The third part focuses on Hindu and Buddhist law, while the fourth part covers China and Japan. The book's closing section examines tribal societies, e.g. Mongols, Pashtuns and Malays. Topics covered include the interaction of legal systems within a legal circle, inter-systemic interactions, reasons for the failure and success of legal modernization, legal pluralism, and its effects on Asian societies. Family law, law of obligation, criminal law, and procedural law are also explored.

The essays collected in this book address legislation from the viewpoint of legal theory and provide an overview of current research in legisprudence as a new scholarly approach to lawmaking. The overall focus of the volume is on the justification of legislation, with a special emphasis on the intricate notion of legislative rationality. With the rational justification of legislation as their central theme, the essays elaborate on the foundations and bounds of legislation and the search for a more principled lawmaking, discuss the role of legislation within the framework of democratic constitutionalism, analyze legislation as implementation of constitutional law, and explore how legislative argumentation in parliament can be construed as a source of justification of laws.

Striking a balance between the aspirations of individual freedom and the demands of organized society is a central quest of constitutional law. Germany and America provide different paths toward accomplishment of this equilibrium, revealing two paths to freedom and its relation to community. This work is addressed to philosophers of law, political theorists, constitutional lawyers, and everyone interested in protecting human rights and learning the meaning of human personality and freedom as expressed in democratic constitutional regimes. Eberle challenges current thinking in the field by setting out alternative visions of human freedom, dignity, personality and expression; demonstrating that use of comparative methodology has much to offer critical examination of major constitutional and public policy issues; and showing that different conceptions of fundamental ideas are possible. Exploring the nature of human personality as reflected in the constitutional law of two important constitutional democracies, Eberle inquires into human values and human freedom, across national borders, in pursuit of a better understanding of human potential and the nature and limit of freedom. The central personality traits examined comprise human dignity; autonomy; self-determination and identity, including privacy, computer privacy, control over personal information, and maintenance of one's image, words, and reputation; abortion; and freedom of expression, including defamation, offensive speech, hate speech, and burning of the flag. The book weaves between German and American law in examining these questions, providing a unique comparative perspective on the idea of human personality and freedom.

Preface International conferences are not organized overnight-especially not when high ranking personalities from politics, business and academia should be offered an adequate platform for addressing and discussing highly relevant contemporary issues. The conference on "The Role of Law and Ethics in the Globalized Economy," which took place on May 22 and 23, 2008 in the Bavarian Academy of Sciences and Humanities in Munich, was no exception. When the first preparations started at the end of 2006, neither the subprime crises nor the general crises of the global financial system, whose shock waves have rocked the financial businesses in subsequent months, were known; nor were they predictable or even imaginable. Based on our monitoring of the globalization process and its apparent impact-not only on the economic and technological environment, but also on the social en- ronment-it was appropriate for the conference to begin by serving as a platform for analysing the status quo of the process of globalization, as relevant to politics, business and academia, and for exploring how the interest groups in those domains cope with the challenges of globalization. In the end, however, the purpose of the conference was to produce proposals for conditions for "upwards" global compe- tion, meaning that minimum conditions should be worked out to enable people to live and labour humanely. Such conditions would be those which should help avoid otherwise inevitable frictions in society, both nationally and internationally.

Autonomy in the Law considers one of the most important benefits of the rule of law. Juxtaposing European and American conceptions of autonomy in the law of families, capital punishment and, criminal trials reveals the common values that justify all legal systems. Law protects the autonomy of individuals and associations by defending the boundaries of their own self-rule. This book illuminates the fundamental purpose of law by examining how European and American lawyers, judges and citizens do and should apply legal autonomy to the practical circumstances of litigation, legislation and the law.

Trace the roots of the concept of equal protection from the American Revolution and the formation of the Constitution through its application today using this collection of 177 primary documents from a variety of sources. Students can use this unique reference resource to examine the tension between the concept of equal protection and recognition of slavery in the constitutional order, to explore the devitalization and revitalization of the 14th and 15th Constitutional amendments from the era of Jim Crow through the Civil Rights movement, and to study current court rulings on equal protection of the law. Petitions, laws, court decisions, personal accounts, and a variety of other documents bring to life the experiences of African Americans in the American constitutional order. Five historical periods are explored with particular emphasis on the concept of equal protection of the law and its particular embodiment in the 14th Amendment. These include: the roots of the concept of equal protection in the Anglo-American experience, the lives of African Americans under a Constitution that incorporated equal protection yet recognized slavery, the 14th and 15th Amendments and the development of Jim Crow, 20th-century developments in the application of equal protection to race, and the accomplishments of the Civil Rights movement and developments since that time. The introductory and explanatory text helps readers understand the nature of the conflicts, the issues being litigated, and the social and cultural pressures that shaped each debate. This welcome resource will provide students with the opportunity to understand the various arguments put forth in different debates, encouraging readers to consider all sides when drawing their own conclusions.

Several books have been written on the Rwandan Genocide and the Sierra Leonean civil war. None has yet examined in its own right the various contexts and foundations on which the jurisprudence of tribunals set up by the international community to try perpetrators of the international crimes committed in the territories of the two countries was developed. This book fills that void. The two tribunals have had their successes and failures, with the international tribunal for Rwanda singled out for the most poignant criticism for prosecuting only perpetrators from one side only of the conflict. In this context, the criticism that it is victors' justice can hardly be shaken off. The jurisprudence developed in trials that are tainted with an accusation as serious as this may be read with jaundiced eyes. Yet it has contributed to the development of international law generally although the judgment of history on it will almost always be harsh because of its discriminatory and selective foundation. Obviously, most of the jurisprudence will not be stare decisis because of the complex nature of the cases and the political motivations that sometimes influenced the proceedings. There can hardly be any gainsaying that although the nature of the crimes may be similar, no two conflicts can be the same. Each comes with its specificity. This specificity and several political economic and socio-cultural factors significantly influence the course of the judicial proceedings before the courts set up to prosecute crimes perpetrated in the confl icts and the jurisprudence developed in those proceedings. This book brings to the attention of the reader some of the evidentiary and contextual foundations on which the jurisprudence in the two courts was established. The jurisprudence without doubt will shape the course of the human history in ways unimagined as it is cited in cases that will come for determination before other international tribunals. Understanding the contextual foundations on which the jurisprudence was established will greatly contribute to the certainty of its application and with it that of the law. The author's is a modest yet noble and salutary contribution to international criminal jurisprudence coming at the heels of the scaling down of the tribunals and the start of the residual mechanisms for both the ICTR and the SCSL. The book is highly recommended to all persons from all walks of life; including victims who sometime wondered how these tribunals worked and the legal and factual foundations underlying established jurisprudence.

This second volume of ReConFort, published open access, addresses the decisive role of constitutional normativity, and focuses on discourses concerning the legal role of constitutional norms. Taken together with ReConFort I (National Sovereignty), it calls for an innovative reassessment of constitutional history drawing on key categories to convey the legal nature of the constitution itself (national sovereignty, precedence, justiciability of power, judiciary as constituted power). In the late 18th and early 19th centuries, constitutional normativity began to complete the legal fixation of the entire political order. This juridification in one constitutional text resulted in a conceptual differentiation from ordinary law, which extends to alterability and justiciability. The early expressions of this 'new order of the ages' suggest an unprecedented and irremediable break with European legal tradition, be it with British colonial governance or the French ancien regime. In fact, while the shift to constitutions as a hierarchically 'higher' form of positive law was a revolutionary change, it also drew upon old liberties. The American constitutional discourse, which was itself heavily influenced by British common law, in turn served as an inspiration for a variety of constitutional experiments - from the French Revolution to Napoleon's downfall, in the halls of the Frankfurt Assembly, on the road to a unified Italy, and in the later theoretical discourse of twentieth-century Austria. If the constitution states the legal rules for the law-making process, then its Kelsian primacy is mandatory. Also included in this volume are the French originals and English translations of two vital documents. The first - Emmanuel Joseph Sieyes' Du Jury Constitutionnaire (1795) - highlights an early attempt to reconcile the democratic values of the French Revolution with the pragmatic need to legally protect the Revolution. The second - the 1812 draft of the Constitution of the Kingdom of Poland - presents the 'constitutional propaganda' of the Russian Tsar Alexander I to bargain for the support of the Lithuanian and Polish nobility. These documents open new avenues of research into Europe's constitutional history: one replete with diverse contexts and national experiences, but above all an overarching motif of constitutional decisiveness that served to complete the juridification of sovereignty. (www.reconfort.eu)

An examination of the language of law in the area of political representation, this book considers the development and recognition of group claims brought pursuant to the Voting Rights Act and the Equal Protection Clause in Supreme Court opinions. In his analysis, Burke highlights the different, discursive strategies, broadly identified as liberal and communitarian, used by the Supreme Court to justify the outcomes of various cases, and he argues that no particular strategy of justification is inherently politically conservative or liberal and that no conception of political representation is unassailable. Therefore, it is unlikely that the Supreme Court will articulate a stable measure of fair representation.

The Supreme Court offers one more forum in the deliberation over what is fair representation; however, it is not likely to provide minority communities with a legal answer to the problem of political underrepresentation. As such, this book tells the uncertain story of the creation of political fairness by the Supreme Court. The language used to characterize what is fair and representative, and the theoretical designs which the rhetoric reflects, allows us to formulate concepts of fair representation as legal standards evolve. By placing the debate over fair representation in not only political and legal but also philosophical terms, we are better able to understand the inevitable tensions that drive the concept of representation into new, ill-defined, and contentious areas.

This book traces the development of Oman's inclusive agreements and highlights their importance for international negotiations, dealing with issues most relevant to humanity's own survival today, nuclear weapons or climate change. In Oman, a historical seafaring nation on the south-eastern corner of the Arabian Peninsula, a culture of agreement that accommodates the interests of everyone has developed around the division of scarce water resources. Life in the arid inland of the Omani Hajar mountains would not have been possible without water. Irrigation channel (falaj) construction is extremely old and skilful therein. Local practices evolved around the division of water and land on the basis of fairness. The community would be best served by inclusion and the avoidance of conflict. A specific Islamic school called Ibadi arrived at Oman early on in the eighth century. Ibadi scholars conserved local practices. Consultation and mediation by sheikhs and the religious leader, Imam, became the law of the land. The Omanis were known as the People of Consultation, Ahl Al Shura. In time, the practice of inclusive agreements would extend far beyond the village level, affecting Omans foreign policy under Sultan Qaboos. Omans water diplomacy succeeded in uniting the contestants of the Middle East Peace Process in the 1990s to work together on common problems of water desalination.

In the collected essays here, Schlag established himself as one of the most creative thinkers in the contemporary legal academy. To read them one after another is exhilarating; Schlag's sophistication shines through. In chapter after chapter he tackles the most vexing problems of law and legal thinking, but at the heart of his concern is the questions of normativity and the normative claims made by legal scholars. He revisits legal realism, eenergizes it, and brings readers face-to-face with the central issues confronting law at the end of the 20th century.
--"Choice, May 1997"

Pierre Schlag is the great iconoclast of the American legal academy. Few law professors today are so consistently original, funny, and provocative. But behind his playful manner is a serious goal: bringing the study of law into the late modern/ postmodern age. Reading these essays is like watching a one-man truth squad taking on all of the trends and movements of contemporary jurisprudence. All one can say to the latter is, better take cover.
--J. M. Balkin, Lafayette S. Foster Professor, Yale Law School

At a time when complaints are heard everywhere about the excesses of lawyers, judges, and law itself, Pierre Schlag focuses attention on the American legal mind and its urge to lay down the law. For Schlag, legalism is a way of thinking that extends far beyond the customary official precincts of the law.

His work prompts us to move beyond the facile self- congratulatory self-representations of the law so that we might think critically about its identity, effects, and limitations. In this way, Schlag leads us to rethink the identities and character of moral and political values in contemporary discourse. The book brings into question the dominant normative orientation that shapes so much academic thought in law and in the humanities and social sciences. By pulling the curtain on the rhetorical techniques by which the law represents itself as coherent, rational, and stable, Laying Down the Law discloses the grandiose (and largely futile) attempts of American academics to control social and political meaning by means of scholarly missives.

In the last half century, the rule of law has increasingly been appealed to as a common global value. The Handbook on the Rule of Law analyses the appeal of this idea, its context, and background through a range of questions about the character, history and global reach of the rule of law, offering readers a definitive understanding of this central global norm. Original contributions from leading academics explore the rule of law conceptually and historically through its associated institutions, as well as examine detailed cases evaluating how the everyday application of the rule of law impacts society as a whole. Exploring a wide range of research on the social, political and economic dimensions of the rule of law, this Handbook clearly illustrates the link between the rule of law and the global political system. This informative Handbook will be key reading for post-graduate students of international relations, global politics, and law, as well as for legal scholars wanting to build upon their knowledge with a wider account of the rule of law. Researchers in areas impacted by the rule of law will also find this volume to be stimulating reading. Contributors include: J. Allison, T. Almeida Cravo, D. Banik, A. Bedner, P. Costa, C. Cutler, D.l. Desai, C. Feinaugle, J. Flood, T. Ginsburg, J. Gutmann, S. Hinderling, D. Howath, T. Kellogg, T. Krever, M. Krygier, A. Loretoni, F. Macaulay, A. Magen, C. May, J. Moller, P. Nicholson, L. Pech, M.M. Prado, M. Rishmawi, C. Schwoebel-Patel, L.B. Tiede, V. Vadi, S. Voigt, C. Walker, A. Wiener, A. Winchester, P. Zumbansen

This book analyses cases of judicial avoidance: what happens when courts leave some or all of the merits of a case undecided? It explores examples of justiciability assessments and deferential approaches regarding the decision of another authority and examines legitimacy issues involving judicial avoidance. The reader is presented with answers to two fundamental questions that guide the development of the book: - Is it legitimate to practise judicial avoidance? - How could judicial avoidance be practised legitimately? The conflict of competences, which often emerges in instances of judicial avoidance, is an important book baseline. From this conflict, the book considers and defends the possibility of applying ‘formal balancing’ to provide a clearer structure of the exercise of justiciability and judicial deference. The ‘formal balancing’ methodology is based on Alexy’s principles theory, and its connection with judicial avoidance represents a significant contribution and novel point in constitutional adjudication.

This book addresses fundamental aspects of the concept of public international law in both theory and practice. The argument developed by the author is that, underlying the traditional, horizontal, structure of public international law, a vertical structure of the concept of law may be discerned. This vertical structure is seen unfolding into two, mutually exclusive, frameworks: a framework of obligation, accounting for obligations, and a framework of authorization, accounting for rights. The problem then arising is that a concept of public international law which only admits either rights or obligations cannot be regarded as coherent. The author, however, takes and substantiates the position that coherence can be achieved by suppressing the mutual exclusivity of both frameworks. This move paves the way to formulating the function of public international law in terms of the constituting of international society. Since in public international law the theoretical aspects profoundly affect practice, this book is not only of interest to academics, but also for practitioners, such as officials of foreign offices and international institutions.

A SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER In the past few decades, legislatures throughout the world have suffered from gridlock. In democracies, laws and policies are just as soon unpicked as made. It seems that Congress and Parliaments cannot forge progress or consensus. Moreover, courts often overturn decisions made by elected representatives. In the absence of effective politicians, many turn to the courts to solve political and moral questions. Rulings from the Supreme Courts in the United States and United Kingdom, or the European court in Strasbourg may seem to end the debate but the division and debate does not subside. In fact, the absence of democratic accountability leads to radicalisation. Judicial overreach cannot make up for the shortcomings of politicians. This is especially acute in the field of human rights. For instance, who should decide on abortion or prisoners' rights to vote, elected politicians or appointed judges? Expanding on arguments first laid out in the 2019 Reith Lectures, Jonathan Sumption argues that the time has come to return some problems to the politicians.

For more than a century Western democracies have struggled to keep faith with both economic efficiency and social justice. Yet reconciliation of these factors remains as baffling as ever. Among the many voices clamoring today for a theory of collective action, we hear most often of the great chasm between "legitimacy" and "efficiency." It is the contention of the authors of this ground-breaking book that these antinomies can be seen as distinct "moments of application" in the operation of normative judgment, and that a reflexive treatment of norms of collective action, by clarifying limitations in rules and beliefs, allows us to develop mechanisms to correct the limiting effects of such judgments and act accordingly. Drawing on and developing recent trends in the social sciences, The Action of Norms presents a powerful new theory of governance with far-reaching implications for the future of law, the judiciary, and justice itself. Among the contributing modern ideas that are explained and developed as pillars of the authors' thesis are the following: critiques of the "political theory of interest groups; " the economic theory of efficiency; deliberative democracy; rational choice theory; the evolutionist debate; learning process theory; and the theory of risk.

The view that persons are entitled to respect because of their moral agency is commonplace in contemporary moral theory. What exactly this respect entails, however, is far less uncontroversial. In this book, Van der Rijt argues powerfully that this respect for persons' moral agency must also encompass respect for their subjective moral judgments - even when these judgments can be shown to be fundamentally flawed. Van der Rijt scrutinises the role persons' subjective moral judgments play within the context of coercion and domination. His fresh, original analysis of Kant's third formulation of the Categorical Imperative reveals how these judgments are intimately connected to a person's dignity. The result is an insightful new account of coercion, a novel Kantian reformulation of the republican notion of non-domination and a compelling, innovative argument in favour of retributive justice. "In this admirably clear and insightful work, Van der Rijt develops an original account of coercion and dignity. On the basis of his analysis of the relation between these two concepts, he also provides an intriguing new angle on the nature of republicanism. I recommend this book to anyone interested in freedom and power and their roles in normative political theory." Ian Carter - University of Pavia "In this carefully argued and original study Jan-Willem van der Rijt offers an analysis of coercion, a broadly Kantian argument that coercion is an affront to dignity, and an illuminating contrast with Philip Pettit's republicanism. A most welcome contribution." Thomas E. Hill, Jr. - University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill "Jan-Willem van der Rijt has written a well argued, original book that will prove to be extremely helpful for the philosophical inquiry of the relationship between coercion and human dignity as well as for the assessment of republicanism and its consequences." Ralf Stoecker - University of Potsdam

Once dismissed as plodding and superfluous, legal scholarship is increasingly challenging the liberal white male establishment that currently dominates legal education and practice. The most significant development since the emergence of the casebook, at the turn of the century, this trend has unleashed a fierce political struggle. At stake is nothing less than the entire enterprise of law and education, and thus a powerful platform from which to shape society.

The result, here vividly recounted by Arthur Austin, has been an uncompromising, take-no-prisoners fight for dominance. The challenge comes from Outsiders, a collection of feminists, critical race theorists, and critical legal studies scholars who rely on unconventional methods such as storytelling to give voice to the underrepresented. In the other, demographically larger camp resides the monolithic Empire, consisting of traditionalists who, having developed an effective form of scholarship, now circle the wagons against the outsider heathens.

Neither partisan nor objective, Austin is both respectful and critical of each faction. The Empire, he believes, is imperious, closed-minded, and self-perpetuating; the Outsiders are too often paranoid, anti-pragmatic, and overly tolerant of fringe work. Is the new scholarship a vacuous, overpoliticized, soon-to-be-vanquished trend or the harbinger of an important new paradigm? Is reconciliation possible? Anyone with a vested interest in the answer to these questions, and in the future of law, cannot afford to miss Arthur Austin's invaluable volume.

Arthur Austin is the Edgar A. Hahn Professor of Jurisprudence at Case Western Reserve University.

Ever since Harts The Concept of Law, legal philosophers agree that the practice of law-applying officials is a fundamental aspect of law. Yet there is a huge disagreement on the nature of this practice. Is it a conventional practice? Is it like the practice that takes place, more generally, when there is a social rule in a group? Does it share the nature of collective intentional action? The book explores the main responses to these questions, and claims that they fail on two main counts: current theories do not explain officials beliefs that they are under a duty qua members of an institution, and they do not explain officials disagreement about the content of these institutional duties. Based on a particular theory of collective action, the author elaborates then an account of certain institutions, and claims that the practice is an institutional practice of sorts. This would explain officials beliefs in institutional duties, and officials disagreement about those duties.

The book should be of interest to legal philosophers, but also to those concerned with group and social action theories and, more generally, with the nature of institutions."

The terrorist attacks occurred in the United States on 11 September 2001 have profoundly altered and reshaped the priorities of criminal justice systems around the world. Atrocities like the 9/11 attacks, the Madrid train bombings of March 2003, and the terrorist act to the United Kingdom of July 2005 threatened the life of democratic nations. The volume explores the response of democratic nation-states to the problems of terrorism and counter-terrorism within the framework of the Rule of Law. One of the primary subjects of study is the ways in which the interests of the state (security from external threats, the maintenance of civil peace, and the promotion of the commonwealth) are balanced or not with the liberty and freedom of the citizens of the state. The distinctive aspect of this focus is that it brings a historical, political, philosophical and comparative approach to the contemporary shape and purposes of the criminal justice systems around the world.

This edited collection brings together a series of interdisciplinary contributions in the field of Information Technology Law. The topics addressed in this book cover a wide range of theoretical and practical legal issues that have been created by cutting-edge Internet technologies, primarily Big Data, the Internet of Things, and Cloud computing. Consideration is also given to more recent technological breakthroughs that are now used to assist, and - at times - substitute for, human work, such as automation, robots, sensors, and algorithms. The chapters presented in this edition address these issues from the perspective of different legal backgrounds. The first part of the book discusses some of the shortcomings that have prompted legislators to carry out reforms with regard to privacy, data protection, and data security. Notably, some of the complexities and salient points with regard to the new European General Data Protection Regulation (EU GDPR) and the new amendments to the Japan's Personal Information Protection Act (PIPA) have been scrutinized. The second part looks at the vital role of Internet intermediaries (or brokers) for the proper functioning of the globalized electronic market and innovation technologies in general. The third part examines an electronic approach to evidence with an evaluation of how these technologies affect civil and criminal investigations. The authors also explore issues that have emerged in e-commerce, such as Bitcoin and its blockchain network effects. The book aims to explain, systemize and solve some of the lingering legal questions created by the disruptive technological change that characterizes the early twenty-first century.