In Europe, from the Middle Ages to the present day, the diversity of legal systems has constantly prevailed. Not only have political entities always been differentiated from one another by their particular law, most of them have also been characterized by a complex governance that implied a diversity of legal statuses in their internal order. Numerous so-called "special rights" and several common rights, at different political levels, have coexisted over the centuries, sometimes with partial overlap. With the exception of rights that are by definition beyond human control (divine law, natural law) and, at a relatively late date, international law, none of these particular or common rights could claim any real universal applicability. Whether in the perspective of a reinforced construction or a dismantling of European law, it is difficult to conceive of Europe outside such an oscillation between particularism and universality.
Alain Wijffels is Director of Research at the CNRS (Centre d'Histoire Judiciaire, Lille-2) and Professor at the Universities of Leiden, Louvain and Louvain-la-Neuve. His work focuses mainly on the comparative history of law in Western Europe.