Sir Basil Markesinis has held tenured senior posts at the Universities of Cambridge, Oxford, University of London, Leiden (in the Netherlands) and the Law School of the University of Texas at Austin where he is now Emeritus Professor of Comparative Methodology. He has also held for a number of years part-time Chairs at the Universities of Paris I (Sorbonne), Paris II (Assas), Munich (Germany), Ghent (Belgium), Siena, Genova and Rome (Italy), the Michigan Law School (at Ann-Arbour) for two years and the Cornell Law School for four years. He has authored or co-authored 53 books, over 150 legal articles, and close to 100 articles on geopolitical issues in journals and newspapers in three continents. His most-recent work is his three-volume illustrated treatise entitled Ancient Greek Poetry from Homer to Roman Times, Jan Sramek, Verlag (2017). His academic work has earned him Fellowships at the Academies of Athens, Belgium, Britain, France, the Netherlands, Rome (Lincei), as well the Athens Archaeological Society and the American Law Institute. For his work in promoting international relations and the study of various European cultures, especially through his creation of the Leiden Institute of Anglo-American Law (in 1987); The Oxford Institute of European and Comparative Law (in 1996) of which he was founder, fund raiser and first director; and the Texas Institute of Global Law (in 2000), he was awarded the insignia of the Knight Grand Cross of the Order of Merit of the Republic of Italy; the Knight Grand Cross of the Order of Merit of the Republic of France; the insignia of the Grand Cross of Service with Star of the Republic of Germany, as well as the insignia of Commander of the Order of the Légion d' honneur of France. In 1997 on the recommendation of the Lord Chancellor, he was appointed Hon. Queen's Counsel; and in 2005, on the advice of the Prime Minister, he was knighted by H. M. Queen Elizabeth II for 'exceptional services to international relations'.

This is an original, deliberately controversial and, at times, disturbing appraisal of the state of comparative law at the beginning of the 21st century: its weaknesses, its strengths, and its protagonists during the preceding thirty-five years.

Abbreviations
Table of Cases
1. Reflections on the State of Comparative Law I: The Twilight of the Heroes
1. Of Ghettoes and Smart Neighbourhoods
2. Decline
2. Reflections on the State of Comparative Law II: The Death of Heroes and the Era of Societal Needs
1. The Emergence of a Strategy
2. The Rabel Method Over Time
3. Functional Specificity: More of the Same Medicine
4. Old (Bad) Habits and New (Silly) Threats
5. From Heroes to Movements of Contemporary Globalisation
3. Spreading the Gospel (and the Name of the Evangelist)
1. Aims to be Pursued
2. Warnings and Caveats
3. Some Raw Data
4. Drawing the First Lessons
5. The Situation in Germany
6. The Case of South Africa
7. A Postscript
4. Foreign Law Inspiring National Law: Lessons from Greatorex v Greatorex
1. The Theory Put into Practice
2. The German Model
3. The Application of the German Idea to Greatorex
4. Unresolved Questions
5. The American Dimension
6. Some Tentative Conclusions
5. The Focused Approach in Public Law
1. Introduction
2. A Study in Parallel
3. The Reasoning of the Courts
4. In Search of a Rapprochement
5. Wider Conclusions
6. Reflecting on the Future: An Epilogue
Appendix 1: Correspondence Between Lord Atkin and Professor H C Gutteridge
Appendix 2: The German Approach
Appendix 3: Databases Searched
Index