Legal Histories of the British Empire : Laws, Engagements and Legacies

Too often law is still relegated to one of a number of forces or trajectories – for example the movements of military forces and commodities – that circulated and operated in Empire. This collection seeks  to investigate law’s central place in the British Empire, and the role of its agents in embedding British rule and culture in colonial territories. Showcasing the richness and diversity of writing about law in Empire, it illuminates the continuities and discontinuities of law’s effects in Empire and the ways in which law was a crucial element in the manifestation of Empire itself. It will be of considerable interest to legal historians, top historians of Empire, and anyone concerned with Empire’s contemporary legacy.

This book is a major contribution to our understanding of the role played by law(s) in the British Empire. Using a variety of interdisciplinary approaches, the authors provide in-depth analyses which shine new light on the role of law in creating the people and places of the British Empire. Ranging from the United States, through Calcutta, across Australasia to the Gold Coast, these essays seek to investigate law’s central place in the British Empire, and the role of its agents in embedding British rule and culture in colonial territories.

One of the first collections to provide a sustained engagement with the legal histories of the British Empire, in particular beyond the settler colonies, this work aims to encourage further scholarship and new approaches to the writing of the histories of that Empire. Legal Histories of the British Empire: Laws, Engagements and Legacies will be of value not only to legal scholars and graduate students, but of interest to all of those who want to know more about the laws in and of the British Empire.