The global turn
From its beginnings, the Brussels School anticipated the emergence of a global society and the need to rethink law at the level of that society, independently of states and their borders. Indeed, the French term mondialisation was coined by Paul Otlet, a member of the Brussels School. As early as the late nineteenth century, Guillaume De Greef developed his theory of borders, which foresaw their gradual disappearance, particularly national borders, in favour of an era of globality. Henri La Fontaine, who received the Nobel Peace Prize in 1913, rejected the principle of state sovereignty and denied that states owned their natural resources. Together with his friend Paul Otlet, he drafted proposals for a world constitution founded on the rights of human beings and of humanity. Later, René Dekkers worked on the basis of comparative law to develop a private law of peoples with universal aspirations.
It is therefore unsurprising that the Brussels School played a full part in the “global turn” in the social sciences from 1990 onwards, and in the study of global law. Global law differs from international law, which is essentially inter-state in character. International law is the law of states or between states, whereas global law is the law of global society.
Global law thus entails a global perspective on law, but from the micro-legal standpoint of the legal subject. Jacques Vanderlinden, an anthropologist, comparatist and legal historian associated with the Brussels School, developed the concept of “legal pluralism”, of which he was one of the principal theorists, in a pragmatic direction. Pluralism no longer refers to relations among the multiple legal orders coexisting in the world, but to the individual’s situation: a plurality of legal rules and, more broadly, norms may apply depending on that person’s circumstances and choices. This situation can lead to forum shopping and regulatory competition among normative orders, with the risk of a “race to the bottom” and the destruction of existing legal rules, particularly national ones. It also encourages the strategic use of comparative law, notably in the struggle to advance particular causes and values on a global scale.
Research at the Brussels School nevertheless shows that globalisation does not produce only destructive effects: it also gives rise to original norms and normative mechanisms. From its anti-formalist perspective, which prioritises observation of forms of living law, the School advocates, notably with Xavier Dieux, widening the scope of law to include alternative forms of normativity generally known as “soft law” or droit mou. Research conducted in particular at the Perelman Centre for Legal Philosophy therefore examines codes of conduct, technical standards, indicators, assessment and ranking mechanisms, and other “unidentified legal objects” (objets juridiques non identifiés, OJNI). It highlights the instruments and dynamics at work in the “global struggle for law”, pursued not only by states and international organisations, but also by companies, NGOs, networks of experts and regulators, global law firms and others.
The Brussels School’s research covers many areas of contemporary society: governance and regulation of the internet and communication networks; financial-market regulation, financial-law instruments, accounting standards and credit-rating agencies; corporate governance and social responsibility; carbon markets and instruments to combat climate change; global constitutional standards, transnational human rights litigation and indicators of legal competitiveness and respect for the law; and European governance instruments as a laboratory for global law. The School shares a pragmatic approach to global law with other movements, such as Global Administrative Law (GAL) at the New York School, the transnational law of the New New Haven School, and certain critical or Global South approaches. These pragmatic approaches differ from theories of global law based on the idea of a legal order or system, such as global constitutionalism, ordered pluralism and systems theories. Benoît Frydman considers such an approach premature and favours a dynamic approach to emerging normativities below, across or beyond the boundaries of legal orders.
