Judicial Territory: Law, Capital, and the Expansion of American Empire
Judicial Territory: Law, Capital, and the Expansion of American Empire
by Shaina Potts
Duke University Press, 2024
ISBNs
Cloth: 978-1-4780-2648-8
Paper: 978-1-4780-3072-0
eISBN: 978-1-4780-9408-1 (OA)
eISBN: 978-1-4780-5971-4 (standard)
About the Book
In Judicial Territory, Shaina Potts reveals how the American empire has benefited from the post-World War II expansion of United States judicial authority over the economic decisions of postcolonial governments. Introducing the term “judicial territory” to refer to the increasingly transnational space over which US courts wield authority, Potts argues that law is an essential tool for US geopolitical and economic interests. Through close examination of cases involving private US companies, on the one hand, and foreign state-owned enterprises, nationalizations, and sovereign debt, on the other, she shows that technical changes relating to the treatment of foreign sovereigns in domestic US law allowed the United States to extend its purview over global financial and economic relations, including many economic decisions of foreign governments. Throughout, Potts argues, US law has not become divorced from territoriality but instead actively remapped it; it has not merely responded to globalization, but actively produced it—making the whole world part of US economic space in the process.
About the Author
Shaina Potts is Associate Professor of Geography at the University of California, Los Angeles.
Reviews
-- Jamie Peck, author of Variegated Economies
-- Joshua Barkan, author of Corporate Sovereignty: Law and Government under Capitalism
“Judicial Territory is a work of singular quality and originality. Shaina Potts presents a remarkably subtle and wide-ranging analysis of the United States’ long-term creep into both the international domain and the sovereign spaces of other countries. Potts brings legal analysis to life, with a fluent and incisive style, an eye for contradiction, irony, and drama, and a facility for navigating thickets of legalese in pursuit of compelling, telling, and revealing story lines. Judicial Territory is a tour de force.”
-- Jamie Peck, author of Variegated Economies
“At a moment when so many US citizens are increasingly skeptical of the Supreme Court, Shaina Potts tells a captivating and crucial story that contextualizes the present while pointing to its troubling implications. Placing readers at the center of the tight embrace between US courts and global capital, Potts shows how the US judiciary extends judicial territory for systemic and structural reasons relating to the dynamics of US geopolitical and economic power. She allows us to see that the relationship between US law and capital is not the result of a few ‘bad apple’ judges; it is actually fundamental to the whole enterprise.”
-- Joshua Barkan, author of Corporate Sovereignty: Law and Government under Capitalism
"Potts’s study is capacious, offering insights on everything from financialization and hegemony to international trade and globalization. But at the core of the book is the history of how we got from US courts being willing to rule in favor of foreign governments and against American firms in the 1920s to the opposite outcome in the 21st century. . . . What Potts has brought to light with Judicial Territory is the crucial role of the law in fashioning and enforcing such subordination—that is, in demanding and securing the obedience of sovereign states."
-- Brett Christophers The Nation
-- Brett Christophers The Nation
"Judicial Territory will be insightful for political geographers, critical geopoliticians, and legal geographers to interrogate the complexity of the contemporary capitalized and depoliticized world."
-- Jin-Soo Lee AAG Review of Books
-- Jin-Soo Lee AAG Review of Books
"Shaina Potts’s Judicial Territory is terrific. . . . Particularly impressive for me were Potts’s scrupulous scholarship and legal learnedness . . . her deft use of case law . . .; her trenchant, packed and carefully constructed arguments . . .; and her engaging writing (meticulous, measured, chiseled, and polished, each word exactly right and in exactly the right order)."
-- Trevor J. Barnes Journal of Urban Affairs
-- Trevor J. Barnes Journal of Urban Affairs
"A painstakingly detailed, yet refreshingly accessible, analysis."
-- Philip Steinberg Journal of Development Studies
-- Philip Steinberg Journal of Development Studies
Tags
Expansion, American Empire, Judicial power, Human Geography, Legal History, Globalization, Political aspects, Law, Political Science, United States, Social Science
Open Access Information
Label: UCLA
License: CC BY-NC 4.0
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