Cooperation across border requires both knowledge of and understanding of different cultures. This is especially valid when it comes to law. This handbook is the first to comprehensively present selected legal cultures based on a very specific set of structural elements which can be found in all legal cultures. Legal cultures are a product of and impacted by some fundamental and commonly shared ideas and expectations of law. In all modern societies these ideas are to a certain degree institutionalized or at least embedded in an institutionalized practise. These practices determine the way lawyers are educated and apply the law, how they engage with the ongoing internationalisation of law and what kind of values they adhere to. Looking at these elements separately enables the reader to identify similarities and differences and to explain them contextually. Understanding these general features of legal cultures can help avoid misunderstandings or misinterpretations of foreign law and its application. In other words, this handbook is a necessary starting point for all kinds of legal comparative studies by academics, students, judges and other legal practitioners.
