Regime theory

Working group

The term ‘regime’ is used to refer to consolidated arrangements of discourses, norms, practices, and institutions. As an analytical category, ‘regime’ opens up interdisciplinary interfaces for legal history, which considers regimes primarily from the perspective of the generation, mediation, and enforcement of norms (regimes of normativity). However, the legal-historical use of the concept requires careful theoretical reflection. The working group ‘Regime theory’ explores the possibilities and limits of regime-theoretical approaches.

In the first phase, the working group focused on those interdisciplinary foundations of regime theory that are particularly relevant for a legal-historical perspective. This phase concluded with the publication of the online symposium Historical Regimes of Normativity. In the second phase, a series of presentations, the preliminary body of theory was critically scrutinised and developed with regard to its practical applicability in the individual Research Fields. Currently, the working group focuses on the question of the possibility of a theoretical description of change in regimes of normativity.