The American Journal of Comparative Law
About the Journal
The American Journal of Comparative Law was founded in 1952. As the official journal of the American Society of Comparative Law, it publishes four issues a year and is devoted to comparative and transnational legal studies – including, among other subjects, comparative law, comparative and transnational legal history and theory, private international law and conflict of laws, and the study of legal systems, cultures, and traditions other than those of the US.
In its long and rich history, The AJCL has published articles authored by scholars representing all continents, regions, and legal cultures of the world. A peer-reviewed, leading journal in the field, it has been hosted in the past by institutions such as the UC Berkeley School of Law, Columbia Law School and the University of Michigan Law School; currently, the Georgetown University Law Center and the McGill University Faculty of Law jointly serve as its host.
From our latest issue
Volume 73, Issue 2, Summer 2025
Articles
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From Legal Transplants to Policy Irritants: Chinese Economic Expansion and Global Legal Change
Pages 430–472, https://doi.org/10.1093/ajcl/avaf021
Since the 1970s, comparative law scholars have studied “legal transplants”: legal institutions that emerged in one location and then were moved to (or forced upon) another. This research agenda offers little traction on one of today’s most pressing questions of global legal change.
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Making Legal Transplant Meaningful in a New Context: Geographical Indications from Europe to China
Pages 384–429, https://doi.org/10.1093/ajcl/avaf001
This Article investigates the interaction between transplanted law and society after legal transplants, focusing on a case study of the changing meaning of geographical indications (GIs) after this legal concept was transplanted from Europe to China.
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Supreme Courts in Polarized Societies: A Comparative Study of Brazil, India, and Israel
Pages 337–383, https://doi.org/10.1093/ajcl/avaf006
How do courts function in an environment of political polarization? This Article aims to gain insight into this question through a comparative case study of three countries—India, Brazil, and Israel—examining the challenges that political polarization posed to their supreme courts and the way each of them chose to respond to them.
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The Taiwanese Roots of East Asia’s War Redress Movement: An Alternate Genealogy
Pages 279–335, https://doi.org/10.1093/ajcl/avaf009
Conventional wisdom pinpoints the origins of East Asia’s World War II redress movement in 1990, with the emergence of the “comfort women” issue and subsequent transnational litigation. This Article challenges that narrative by excavating a series of lawsuits, filed by Taiwanese citizens in Japanese courts from the 1970s.
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Rediscovering the Constitutional Preamble? How Judges Enlist Preambles to Legitimate Transformative Interpretations
Pages 236–278, https://doi.org/10.1093/ajcl/avaf011
In this Article, we look at how these texts have been employed by courts, regardless of—and often contrary to—their formal legal status and the political expectations of constitution-makers.
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Adjectival Constitutionalism
Pages 215–235, https://doi.org/10.1093/ajcl/avaf028
Constitutionalism “with adjectives” is now a common part of the comparative constitutional law vocabulary. But scholars often use the same adjectives in different ways, and suggest that different “constitutionalisms” are alternatives, when in fact they overlap in complex ways.
Editors-in-Chief
Vivian Groswald Curran
Distinguished Professor of Law
University of Pittsburgh School of Law
Book Review Editors
Richard Albert, University of Texas at Austin School of Law
Joshua Karton, Queen’s University Faculty of Law
Former Editors-in Chief
Hessel E. Yntema † (1952-1966)
B.J. George † (1966-1968)
Alfred F. Conard (1968-1970)
John G. Fleming † (1971-1987)
Richard M. Buxbaum (1987-2003)
George A. Bermann (2003-2006)
James Gordley (2003-2008)
Mathias W. Reimann (2003-2013)
James Feinerman (2014-2015)
Executive Editorial Board
Luisa Antoniolli, University of Trento Faculty of Law
Gary F. Bell, National University of Singapore Faculty of Law
Francesca Bignami, George Washington University Law School
Mauro Bussani, University of Trieste Law Department
Hannah Buxbaum, University of California Davis School of Law
Helge Dedek, McGill University’s Faculty of Law Alison Dundes Renteln, University of Southern California
Tom Ginsburg, University of Chicago Law School
Simone Glanert, University of Kent Law School
Michele Graziadei, University of Turin
Virginia Harper Ho, City University of Hong Kong
Vicki C. Jackson, Harvard Law School Michael Karayanni, Hebrew University of Jerusalem Ralf Michaels, Max Planck Institute for Comparative and International Private Law
Sherally Munshi, Georgetown University Law Centre Mathias Siems, Durham University Law School
Symeon C. Symeonides, Willamette University College of Law Yvonne Tew, Georgetown University Law Centre Franz Werro, Fribourg University Law Faculty and at the Georgetown University Law Center
Managing Editor
Paula Potter (Oxford University Press)
Articles Editor
Leo Huang, Penn Carey Law, University of Pennsylvania
AJCL Links
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Submit a Manuscript & AJCL Submission Info for Authors (Scholastica)
AJCL Journal Info @ Oxford University Press (OUP)
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