From Conflicts Law to Transformative Law: Facing ‘Fragmented Globalisation’

How does ‘Europe’ cope with its dark past and how does it handle its internal conflicts and contradictions? This is the question at the heart of Christian Joerges’ 600-page opus magnum Conflict and Transformation. Essays on European Law and Policy where he advances his reconceptualization of EU law as a particular form of conflicts law as his answer. But the problem constellation the EU is faced with today is, one might argue, well-beyond what can be encapsulated by a conflicts law perspective. As an alternative the idea of transformative law is introduced. Joerges’ oeuvre moreover has a blind angle, as it is internalistic in nature. But rather than internal forces driving the integration project forward the structural trigger and driver of European integration should be found in the reconfiguration of Europe’s relations with the wider world. From (de-)colonialisation to todays ‘fragmented globalisation’ it is the structural reconfigurations of Europe’s relationships to the rest of the world which is the central driver of the integration process.