Competing Sovereignties

Competing Sovereignties provides a critique of the concept of sovereignty in modernity in light of claims to determine the content of law at the international, national and local levels. In an argument that is illustrated through an analysis of debates over the control of intellectual property law in India, Richard Joyce considers how economic globalization and the claims of indigenous communities do not just challenge national sovereignty - as if national sovereignty is the only kind of sovereignty - but in fact invite us to challenge our conception of what sovereignty ?is?. Combining theoretical research and reflection with an analysis of the legal, institutional and political context in which sovereignties 'compete', the book offers a reconception of modern sovereignty - and, with it, a new appreciation of the complex issues surrounding the relationship between international organisations, nation states and local and indigenous communities.

Introduction: The crisis of modern sovereignty; PART 1: POSITION; Chapter 1: Modern sovereignty and the nation state: a failure of grounds; Chapter 2:Autopositioning: the groundless ground of modern sovereignty; PART 2: RELATION; Chapter 3: The constitutive function of relation; Chapter 4: The relation of sovereigns at the national and international levels: India and the WTO; Chapter 5: The relation of sovereigns at the international, national and local levels; Conclusion

Richard Joyce is based in the Faculty of Law at Monash University, Australia