4 - Conflict of Laws as a Conceptual Battlefield

Summary

The history of private international law is frequently told in terms of a dialectical antithesis between opposing concepts or doctrinal approaches. Historical narratives are thus employed to address presentist concerns. Those supporting one of the embattled approaches often search for historical validation of their views: the history of the field is thus told in terms of the emergence, or persistence, of a dominant concept or approach. But those who seek to escape the constraints of binary oppositions also use history, either suggesting that the time has come to move beyond such antithetical schemes, or in espousing more complex schemes of their own. History can provide them as well with examples of how such polar approaches were tried and failed; or with material supporting notions of doctrinal complexity.