Comparative and Foreign Law

A wide variety of transactions and disputes – ranging from business transactions to child custody arrangements to organized crime—are affected by the laws of one or more foreign jurisdictions. There are also important intellectual reasons to study foreign legal systems. Courses on comparative or foreign law deal with the foreign law of a particular jurisdiction, region, or religion or compare international and foreign rules with respect to a particular topic (such as courses on international and comparative antitrust or comparative intellectual property). These courses are designed to help students become familiar with foreign laws and how they interact, develop competency in foreign legal cultures, understand why those laws might differ from the laws of the United States or from one another, and consider the implications of those differences. Not all courses seek to achieve all of these outcomes.