The Evolution of Law and the State in Europe: Seven Lessons

(Paperback)

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Most books about public power and the state deal with their subject from the point of view of legal theory, sociology or political science. This book, without claiming to deliver a comprehensive theory of law and state, aims to inform by offering a fresh reading of history and institutions, particularly as they have developed in continental Europe and European political and legal science. Drawing on a remarkably wide range of sources from both Western and Eastern Europe, the author suggests that only by knowing the history of the state, and state administration since the twelfth century, can we begin to comprehend the continuing importance of the state and public powers in modern Europe. In an era of globalization, when the importance of international law and institutions frequently lead to the claim that the state either no longer exists or no longer matters, the truth is in fact more complex. We now live in an era where the balance is shifting away from the struggle to build states based on democratic values, towards fundamental values existing above and beyond the borders of nations and states, under the watchful gaze of judges bound by the rule of law.

Reviews

The book is a delightful read, expertly covering more than two thousand years of the law of public administration. -- Mark Weston Janis, University of Connecticut * Journal of Comparative Law *

Author Bio

Spyridon Flogaitis is currently Professor of Administrative Law at the University of Athens, Director of the European Public Law Organization, and an Attorney at Law of the Greek High Court and the Council of State. He is also a member of the Appeals Board of the European Space Agency. He was formerly President of the United Nations Administrative Tribunal (UNAT), Minister of the Interior, Public Administration and Decentralization (Aug-Sept. 2007) and Minister of the Interior (Aug-Sept. 2009).He has a Degree in Law from Athens University, a Docteur en Droit from the University of Paris II (Pantheon-Assas), a Docteur en Histoire from the University of Paris I (Pantheon-Sorbonne), and a Diplome de l'Ecole Pratique des Hautes Etudes. He is Doctor honoris causa, at the National School of Political Science and Public Administration, Bucarest and at the Faculty of Law, University of Lisbon. He is also a Chevalier de la Legion d'Honneur (French Republic), and Cavalliere del'Ordine di Merito (Italian Republic).During 2013 he was the Arthur Goodhart Visiting Professor of Legal Science at the University of Cambridge.