Who has been considered human by the humanities? Along with its emancipatory potential, the humanities have historically also been related to imperial states whose military conquests have implicated the dehumanization of other peoples. Many times, the humanities have offered foundational narratives sustaining imperial projects. This essay takes a constructivist epistemology to explore the concept of humanism, and how it has emerged and changed in different contexts, beginning with the Roman idea of humanitas that focused on civilization to legitimize domination. A critique of colonial Christian humanism reveals how it was used to justify violence against those defined as non or less human, be they women, Africans, or indigenous people. The historical exclusion of many groups from educational institutions and knowledge production shows how the humanities have perpetuated hierarchies of power that, ironically, dehumanized. Movements such as the Renaissance and the Enlightenment, which sought to reform the humanities, continued to favor a Eurocentric culture. This essay advocates for an intercultural approach to the humanities, one that frees itself from imperialism and promotes inclusive dialogues among peoples. This effort must go beyond overcoming Eurocentrism. It must also overcome anthropocentrism to incorporate a more respectful relationship with Nature, recognizing the cultural practices of indigenous peoples, who have maintained a more conscious and harmonious link with beyond human lifeways.

This article explores the systems of policing that emerged in the early Cape Colony (1652–1830). Contrary to previous historical scholarship that understood the institution to be largely nonexistent or of marginal importance to the colony’s political economic development, this article argues that the Cape colony’s systems of policing, which doubled as ad hoc military organizations, were not so much weak as privatized. It shows how this persistent tendency was motivated by the Dutch East India Company’s desire to maximize profits—though it manifested differently in different parts of the colony. Moreover, this article demonstrates that the mercantile economy that the company installed at the Cape ensured that private policing would become a vehicle of indigenous dispossession. In doing so, it seeks to contribute to the field of African carceral studies and understandings of processes of racialization in the early Cape.

This article establishes a foundation for the development of Marxist approaches to European Union (EU) law. While Marxist scholarship has engaged with European integration throughout its history, it has largely overlooked the legal architecture of the EU. Conversely, EU legal studies have remained largely insulated from Marxist thought, even as critical approaches have begun to gain traction. Bridging this mutual neglect, the article argues that EU law must be understood not as a neutral or technocratic system, but as a central element of capitalist social relations both in Europe, and in terms of Europe’s wider integration in the global market. In this way, EU law is bound up with processes of accumulation, imperialism, and racialised social reproduction. Drawing on key currents within Marxist theory, the article situates EU law within the historical dynamics of capitalist development, demonstrating how a materialist legal analysis can deepen and enrich existing critiques of European integration.

In this article, we examine how domestic heating technologies functioned as instruments of spatial reconfiguration and imperial power in twentieth-century Iran. The replacement of the traditional floor-based korsi with portable oil heaters like the Aladdin catalyzed a shift in how domestic space was materially organized. Whereas the heating ecology centered around the korsi unfolded on the ground and resisted Western objects such as sofas, refrigerators, and stoves that needed elevated or upright usage above the floor, the Aladdin enacted a subtle but powerful form of imperialism by reorienting bodies and their spatial modes of habituation toward upright “civilized” living. We argue that this technological shift and spatial elevation enabled the inflow of Western goods into Iranian homes, helping to affix Iran as a semiperipheral state within the global capitalist economic system. Rather than treating materiality as neutral or derivative, this study foregrounds its role as a mediator of social transformation, in which heating technology becomes a vector of governance and spatial elevation a proxy for progress. By centering the home as a site of techno-political encounter, we reveal how imperial rationalities were naturalized through mundane objects within the space of domesticity.

As I pass the 40-year mark of work in cultural heritage and cultural heritage law, I am grateful for the opportunity to reflect on how the field has evolved since the mid-1980s. This reflection acknowledges the contributions of those who influenced the early development of this field and the way their work continues today through the scholarship and activism of their successors. Evolution on the international level was matched with domestic legal accomplishments in the United States—the world’s largest art market—with conclusive recognition of the principle of foreign state ownership to protect archaeological heritage, US ratification of the 1954 Hague Convention, and an expansion of US implementation of the 1970 UNESCO Convention. At the same time, threats to cultural heritage from armed conflict, other forms of violence, and climate-change-induced natural disasters continue, while the field has only started to reckon with the legacies of colonialism and imperialism often embodied in the large public collections in the European former colonial powers and those who purchased cultural objects from them. This article sets out four areas of cultural heritage law in which we have not succeeded sufficiently and the questions that remain for future generations to resolve.

The Berlin Conference (1884–85) is widely studied for its role in fuelling European imperialism and legitimising the scramble for Africa. However, its global impact beyond Europe and Africa has received little attention, with Latin America notably absent. This article examines how prominent diplomats from Argentina, Brazil, Colombia, and Mexico interpreted the proceedings. In their view, Europe’s renewed expansionism in Africa—combining private adventurism, colonisation enterprises, and imperial statecraft—resembled the great powers’ incursions into post-independence Latin America. They feared that new criteria for staking colonial claims would endanger their states’ sovereignty over vast, remote territories. Yet, while opposing intervention, these diplomats embraced civilisational thinking and state-building projects that echoed Eurocentric racial hierarchies. Their arguments reflected both resistance to imperialism and complicity in its logic. By tracing Berlin’s reverberations across multiple regions, this article highlights the broader repercussions of late nineteenth-century ‘high imperialism’ and reassesses the nature of Latin American anti-imperialism.

On 16 March 2022, Russia became the first state to be expelled from the Council of Europe (CoE). The reshaping of power dynamics between international law actors is providing a favourable space to international organizations to use membership as a strategic tool. In order to understand under what circumstances the CoE decides to end membership, the article elucidates the substantive and symbolic grounds of Russia’s expulsion. Substantive grounds are defined as non-compliance with the membership criteria of the CoE and its founding principles as regulated in Article 3 of its Statute. Symbolic grounds are what motivates the CoE in its positioning within the international legal order as indicated in the preamble of its Statute. The analysis of the substantive grounds will reveal that the violation of the CoE Statute and the prohibition on the use of force because of the invasion of Ukraine are not enough to explain Russia’s expulsion. This article argues that Russia’s expulsion relies on symbolic grounds that allowed the CoE to preserve its position as the guardian of European imperialism. The clash of the two actors’ irreconcilable imperial policies proved for the CoE that Russia would no longer be at the receiving end of its demands. The Ukraine invasion signals a breaking point, escalating the inter-imperial rivalry to a level where the CoE believes Russia will no longer submit itself to the European international legal order as shaped by the Western European founders of the Organization.

A desire to preserve its ontological security was crucial in France’s decision to leave Algeria. France neither militarily lost the Algerian War (1954–62), nor were the financial costs of war too burdensome to bear. Instead, the contradictions between two narrative strands of France’s sense of self – liberal-democratic universalism and white European ethnonationalism – came unravelled, sparking a crisis of ontological security. These two narrative strands were rewoven together around the decision to leave Algeria, which saved France from facing a true reckoning about its sense of self and the dynamics of colonialism that had pushed France to create a racial hierarchy that contradicted French republican values. Algeria shows that ontological security can be preserved by using narrative strands to create the impression of stability amid profound changes. Additionally, in critical situations during periods of great global political change, shedding certain role-identities (such as being a colonial power) can help states recover ontological security. France’s pivot away from its colonial empire under President Charles de Gaulle is an example of such a transition away from a specific role-identity that was narrated in such a way that it actually – and paradoxically – projected stability.

What is the role of law in imperial state-building projects? We study this question of historical significance with an empirical focus on Russian arbitrazh (commercial) courts in Crimea. We document the increase in the number of disputes that involve the Russian state and strong pro-government favoritism in court decisions. We also find that arbitrazh courts are used as a check on local political elites. At the same time, our analysis establishes favoritism toward local businesses in disputes with Russian businesses. Most importantly, we highlight that this stick-and-carrot legal politics is not only imposed from above: Local judges who defected to Russia act more favorably than outsider judges appointed from Russia toward the Russian state and businesses, plausibly because local judges want to signal their loyalty. The implication is that imperial legal domination emerges not only through directives from the metropole but also through the everyday contributions of local imperial intermediaries.