Law and Courts

700 years ago, several European polities came together to form a trade-based confederation. Integral to that confederation was the adoption of a common legal code to govern merchants' interactions. The merchants of the Hanseatic League were not the last to recognise the importance of law and courts to good trade and neighbourly relations. The member states of the EU have often integrated through legal means. With Brexit looming, it remains to be seen how the EU will in future (dis)integrate through legal means, and whether the European legal order will become more polycentric. These remarks, inspired by the "Hanseatic" location of the ECPR's 2018 General Conference, apply to the international level—but the role of courts within domestic political systems has never been more controversial. If being attacked is a sign of importance, then European courts have certainly been important in the past few years. This Section builds on the success of the Law and Courts Section at the Oslo General Conference, which featured eight full Panels. We have introduced new sections to respond to member demands, and merged international and domestic-facing Panels.